newyorker--2020-07-27--The Cold War Bunker That Became Home to a Dark-Web Empire

In the mid-nineteen-seventies , the West German Army , the Bundeswehr , built a vast underground bunker near the town of Traben-Trarbach .
It was five stories deep , had nearly sixty thousand square feet of floor space , and was designed to withstand a nuclear attack .
Eighty days ’ worth of survival provisions were stored inside , including an emergency power supply and more than a million litres of drinking water .
You entered the facility through an air lock ; the interior temperature was set to seventy degrees .
The walls were concrete , thirty-one inches thick @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The rooms were soundproof and transmission-proof .
Between 1978 and 2012 , the bunker was the headquarters of the Bundeswehr ’ s meteorological division , and at any one time about three hundred and fifty civilian contractors worked there ; most of them focussed on predicting and plotting weather patterns wherever the German military was deployed .
New employees often got lost .
On each level , the walls were painted a different color , to help people orient themselves—but the bunker was symmetrical , so one side looked much like another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In winter , workers on day shifts arrived in the dark and left in the dark .
In 2012 , the Bundeswehr moved its meteorological division to another site .
Germany ’ s federal real-estate agency , known as BImA , listed the bunker for three hundred and fifty thousand euros .
The low price reflected the unusual nature of the property and the expense of maintaining it .
The bunker sat beneath a plot of some thirty acres , in a forested area on a hill outside Traben-Trarbach , which is an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The perimeter of the property was marked by ramparts and a fence , and aboveground the site contained several large structures , including a gatehouse , an office building , a tall aerial with satellite dishes , a helipad , and barracks constructed by the Nazis in 1933 .
The Bundeswehr had employed twelve men , who worked in shifts around the clock , solely to insure that the bunker was properly ventilated and did not flood .
The German government hoped that a technology business , or perhaps a hotel , might @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few prospective buyers .
The relocation of the Bundeswehr division was a blow to the local economy .
Traben-Trarbach is a fairy-tale town that straddles a bend in the wide , teal-blue Mosel River .
Traben is on the north bank , Trarbach on the south .
The town , which is overlooked by a ruined fourteenth-century castle , is full of aesthetic quirks and highly caloric delicacies .
Only about six thousand people live there , but thousands of tourists arrive every summer to hike , drink the local Riesling , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the twentieth century , Traben-Trarbach was a wine-trading hub second only to Bordeaux , and also a center of the Jugendstil movement , the German iteration of Art Nouveau ; many of its buildings reflect the wealth and the brio of that period .
Near the hotel where I stayed in December , a Jugendstil relief of Rapunzel adorned the side of an apartment building .
Her gilded hair fell in wavy lines from the fourth floor to the second .
The mayor of Traben-Trarbach , Patrice-Christian-Roger Langer , a garrulous man @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the bunker complex for nearly thirty years , and for eleven of them he operated its mainframe computer .
He enjoyed his time working underground .
But , he told me , “ not everybody could deal with working in a bunker , ” adding , “ It ’ s a mental thing .
.
.
if you don ’ t have a window.
” In 2012 , a foundation controlled by a fifty-three-year-old Dutchman named Herman-Johan Xennt proposed to buy the bunker complex .
Xennt travelled to Traben-Trarbach to explain his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ town council .
He was a striking man , with a cascade of shoulder-length gray-blond hair , and wore a dark suit , which highlighted the pallor of his face .
Xennt told the council that he intended to set up a Web-hosting business at the bunker complex , and promised to create as many as a hundred jobs for local people , but he was vague when pressed for details .
Several council members were concerned about Xennt ’ s credentials .
Although he said that he had been in the Web-hosting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ name any blue-chip clients .
But there were no other viable buyers , and so , in June , 2013 , the property was sold to Xennt ’ s foundation .
One of the council members , Heide Pönnighaus , later told a newspaper , “ I didn ’ t have the best feeling about it.
” Xennt was born Herman-Johan Verwoert-Derksen , in 1959 .
He grew up in Arnhem , a small city in the eastern Netherlands which had been the site of intense fighting during the Second World War .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ in historical buildings , and several times he visited an old Nazi bunker on the edge of town .
He also fell in love with science fiction , and began calling himself Xennt ( pronounced “ Zent ” ) .
When “ Star Wars ” was released , in 1977 , he was enraptured by it .
He decorated his bedroom to look like a spaceship , with blacked-out windows , jury-rigged electric doors , and speakers playing moody synthesizer music .
In one corner of the room was an Apple II personal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he had officially changed his surname .
Nothing irritated him more than being called by his given name , and he preferred to be called by his new surname alone .
Even his parents knew him simply as Xennt .
After graduating from college , in the early eighties , he started several personal-computer businesses in the Netherlands .
A poster for a store that he owned , PC International , shows him with long brown hair , bushy eyebrows , and an unconvincing mustache .
He is wearing a T-shirt with “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is standing behind a bulky monitor emblazoned with the store ’ s logo .
During this period , he and a partner , a woman of Dutch Antillean heritage named Angelique , had two sons .
They named them Xyonn and Yennoah : X and Y. Xennt and Angelique soon separated , and she retained primary custody of the boys .
( Xennt also has a son who was born in 2019 , to a different mother . )
In 1995 , when Xennt was thirty-five , he bought a twenty-thousand-square-foot former NATO @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , near the North Sea coast .
The bunker , built forty-one years earlier , had ceased being used for military purposes in 1994 .
Xennt settled in with some old friends , including Paul Scheepers , a computer technician with a bald pate , long curly hair , and a sweet laugh .
Scheepers is now fifty-eight years old , and works in I.T .
support for a Dutch badminton foundation , but he still introduces himself by the online sobriquet that he adopted in the eighties : Cytrax .
“ We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a kind of futuristic environment , ” Scheepers told me recently .
“ And what do you do when you have a bunker and you have a computer company ?
You put computers in the bunker.
” At the Goes property , Xennt started a new business , called CyberBunker , which offered “ bulletproof hosting ” to Web sites .
All Web sites must be physically hosted somewhere , whether on a personal computer or a server ; hosting is now a multibillion-dollar industry dominated by such companies as Amazon Web Services @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a steep price , a highly secure hosting environment for sites containing sensitive , or illicit , material .
In the late nineties , most of CyberBunker ’ s customers ran pornographic sites .
Xennt had a liberal outlook , but there were lines he would not cross .
According to CyberBunker ’ s Web site , its servers would host all content except “ child pornography and anything related to terrorism.
” I spoke to a former pornography distributor who used Xennt ’ s servers during this period .
( He did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , as he now works in finance . )
He told me that his business brought in about a million euros a year , but that Xennt himself had relatively little money , because he had imprudently bought hundreds of servers—an investment in infrastructure that took several years to pay off .

In the mid-nineteen-seventies, the West German military, the Bundeswehr, built a vast underground bunker near the town of Traben-Trarbach. It was five stories deep, had nearly sixty thousand square feet of floor space, and was designed to withstand a nuclear attack. Eighty days’ worth of survival provisions were stored inside, including an emergency power supply and more than a million litres of drinking water. You entered the facility through an air lock; the interior temperature was set to seventy degrees. The walls were concrete, thirty-one inches thick, and some were lined with copper. The rooms were soundproof and transmission-proof. Between 1978 and 2012, the bunker was the headquarters of the Bundeswehr’s meteorological division, and at any one time about three hundred and fifty civilian contractors worked there; most of them focussed on predicting and plotting weather patterns wherever the German military was deployed. New employees often got lost. On each level, the walls were painted a different color, to help people orient themselves—but the bunker was symmetrical, so one side looked much like another. There was no natural light. In winter, workers on day shifts arrived in the dark and left in the dark.
In 2012, the Bundeswehr moved its meteorological division to another site. Germany’s federal real-estate agency, known as BImA, listed the bunker for three hundred and fifty thousand euros. The low price reflected the unusual nature of the property and the expense of maintaining it. The bunker sat beneath a plot of some thirty acres, in a forested area on a hill outside Traben-Trarbach, which is an hour east of the Belgian border. The perimeter of the property was marked by ramparts and a fence, and aboveground the site contained several large structures, including a gatehouse, an office building, a tall aerial with satellite dishes, a helipad, and barracks constructed by the Nazis in 1933. The Bundeswehr had employed twelve men, who worked in shifts around the clock, solely to insure that the bunker was properly ventilated and did not flood. The German government hoped that a technology business, or perhaps a hotel, might want the premises, but there were few prospective buyers.
The relocation of the Bundeswehr division was a blow to the local economy. Traben-Trarbach is a fairy-tale town that straddles a bend in the wide, teal-blue Mosel River. Traben is on the north bank, Trarbach on the south. The town, which is overlooked by a ruined fourteenth-century castle, is full of aesthetic quirks and highly caloric delicacies. Only about six thousand people live there, but thousands of tourists arrive every summer to hike, drink the local Riesling, and take river cruises. At the turn of the twentieth century, Traben-Trarbach was a wine-trading hub second only to Bordeaux, and also a center of the Jugendstil movement, the German iteration of Art Nouveau; many of its buildings reflect the wealth and the brio of that period. Near the hotel where I stayed in December, a Jugendstil relief of Rapunzel adorned the side of an apartment building. Her gilded hair fell in wavy lines from the fourth floor to the second.
The mayor of Traben-Trarbach, Patrice-Christian-Roger Langer, a garrulous man with a fine gray beard, worked at the bunker complex for nearly thirty years, and for eleven of them he operated its mainframe computer. He enjoyed his time working underground. But, he told me, “not everybody could deal with working in a bunker,” adding, “It’s a mental thing . . . if you don’t have a window.”
In 2012, a foundation controlled by a fifty-three-year-old Dutchman named Herman-Johan Xennt proposed to buy the bunker complex. Xennt travelled to Traben-Trarbach to explain his plans to a closed session of the town council. He was a striking man, with a cascade of shoulder-length gray-blond hair, and wore a dark suit, which highlighted the pallor of his face. Xennt told the council that he intended to set up a Web-hosting business at the bunker complex, and promised to create as many as a hundred jobs for local people, but he was vague when pressed for details.
Several council members were concerned about Xennt’s credentials. Although he said that he had been in the Web-hosting business for years, he did not name any blue-chip clients. But there were no other viable buyers, and so, in June, 2013, the property was sold to Xennt’s foundation. One of the council members, Heide Pönnighaus, later told a newspaper, “I didn’t have the best feeling about it.”
Xennt was born Herman-Johan Verwoert-Derksen, in 1959. He grew up in Arnhem, a small city in the eastern Netherlands which had been the site of intense fighting during the Second World War. As a teen-ager, he became interested in historical buildings, and several times he visited an old Nazi bunker on the edge of town. He also fell in love with science fiction, and began calling himself Xennt (pronounced “Zent”). When “Star Wars” was released, in 1977, he was enraptured by it. He decorated his bedroom to look like a spaceship, with blacked-out windows, jury-rigged electric doors, and speakers playing moody synthesizer music. In one corner of the room was an Apple II personal computer.
By his early twenties, he had officially changed his surname. Nothing irritated him more than being called by his given name, and he preferred to be called by his new surname alone. Even his parents knew him simply as Xennt. After graduating from college, in the early eighties, he started several personal-computer businesses in the Netherlands. A poster for a store that he owned, PC International, shows him with long brown hair, bushy eyebrows, and an unconvincing mustache. He is wearing a T-shirt with “Xennt” printed on it, and is standing behind a bulky monitor emblazoned with the store’s logo. During this period, he and a partner, a woman of Dutch Antillean heritage named Angelique, had two sons. They named them Xyonn and Yennoah: X and Y. Xennt and Angelique soon separated, and she retained primary custody of the boys. (Xennt also has a son who was born in 2019, to a different mother.)
In 1995, when Xennt was thirty-five, he bought a twenty-thousand-square-foot former NATO bunker in the Dutch town of Goes, near the North Sea coast. The bunker, built forty-one years earlier, had ceased being used for military purposes in 1994. Xennt settled in with some old friends, including Paul Scheepers, a computer technician with a bald pate, long curly hair, and a sweet laugh. Scheepers is now fifty-eight years old, and works in I.T. support for a Dutch badminton foundation, but he still introduces himself by the online sobriquet that he adopted in the eighties: Cytrax. “We were looking for some space to make a kind of futuristic environment,” Scheepers told me recently. “And what do you do when you have a bunker and you have a computer company? You put computers in the bunker.”
At the Goes property, Xennt started a new business, called CyberBunker, which offered “bulletproof hosting” to Web sites. All Web sites must be physically hosted somewhere, whether on a personal computer or a server; hosting is now a multibillion-dollar industry dominated by such companies as Amazon Web Services and GoDaddy. CyberBunker offered, for a steep price, a highly secure hosting environment for sites containing sensitive, or illicit, material. In the late nineties, most of CyberBunker’s customers ran pornographic sites. Xennt had a liberal outlook, but there were lines he would not cross. According to CyberBunker’s Web site, its servers would host all content except “child pornography and anything related to terrorism.”
“The pear-shaped object approaching the house isn’t your father?” Cartoon by Frank Cotham Copy link to cartoon Copy link to cartoon Shop Shop
I spoke to a former pornography distributor who used Xennt’s servers during this period. (He did not want me to publish his name, as he now works in finance.) He told me that his business brought in about a million euros a year, but that Xennt himself had relatively little money, because he had imprudently bought hundreds of servers—an investment in infrastructure that took several years to pay off.
A curious mixture of adolescent-male fantasia and techno-anarchist utopia, CyberBunker anticipated the current trend for apocalypse-ready hideaways owned by the rich and paranoid. The pornographer visited the Goes facility several times. Xennt’s taste in interior design had changed little since he had decorated his teen-age bedroom: the bunker was furnished with computer terminals, black leather sofas, neon-red lamps, and artificial plants. Ethereal music was often playing. The pornographer found the bunker’s atmosphere strange but “impressive”; its denizens were “alternative” people. Xennt had an odd diet. For breakfast, he ate frikandel—a skinless, deep-fried pork sausage, which is a popular snack in the Netherlands—along with an assortment of vitamins. “Xennt was a mysterious guy,” the pornographer told me, laughing. Two other former colleagues remember that the Goes bunker had a “porno room” where there were sometimes live sex shows involving Xennt’s girlfriends.
In 1999, a young programmer named Sven Kamphuis, who went by the online handle CB3ROB, joined the CyberBunker collective. Kamphuis worked a day job at the Dutch Internet firm XS4ALL. He had unruly black eyebrows and a crazy mop of black hair, and his colleagues at XS4ALL thought that he looked like Bert, from “Sesame Street.” They also remember him as rude, childish, and prone to conspiracy theories. But Kamphuis’s talent for programming was undeniable. He soon became one of Xennt’s lieutenants.
At around the same time, Xennt rented part of the bunker to another group. On July 27, 2002, there was an explosion in that section, and in the fire that ensued Xennt suffered burns on his hands and his face. The police showed up, and in the charred ruins of the bunker they found the remnants of a laboratory for making Ecstasy. Xennt’s business license was taken away, but he was not charged with any crime. He maintained that he had known nothing about the drug factory, and that the subletting group had assured him it was a painting company. CyberBunker’s servers were moved to aboveground facilities, in Amsterdam and elsewhere.
Xennt encouraged the notion that CyberBunker was more than a business. Less than a week after the fire, on August 1, 2002, he and Kamphuis published a declaration of independence for a new state, which they called the Republic of CyberBunker. Citing a U.N. Security Council resolution from 1960, which said that “all people have the right to self-determination,” the Republic of CyberBunker—population six—seceded from the Netherlands. CyberBunker declared as its sovereign territory the five hundred acres containing the ruined bunker. The country’s official currencies would be gold, dollars, and euros, and each resident would pay a flat tax of fifteen thousand dollars a year. Unusually for a republic, it had a royal family. Its President was His Majesty King Xennt von CyberBunker, and its minister of foreign affairs and telecommunications was His Royal Highness Prince Sven Olaf von CyberBunker-Kamphuis.
Kamphuis often acted as CyberBunker’s spokesperson, and he promoted anti-authoritarian, libertarian ideas. Among his tenets: free speech is supreme; everyone has a right to be online; the Internet erases the power of the state; copyright is twentieth-century bullshit. Such notions were in fashion during the nineties, when big technology firms had yet to dominate the Internet. In 1996, John Perry Barlow, the anarchist writer and a founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a group committed to digital freedom and privacy, wrote an influential manifesto that began, “Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of the Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not welcome among us. You have no sovereignty where we gather.”


newyorker--2020-07-27--Rethinking the Science of Skin

Rethinking the Science of Skin

When my sister and I were young , we liked to come home from school and turn on “ Guiding Light , ” a soap opera on CBS .
We only ever caught the last fifteen minutes of the hour-long show , but , because it wasn ’ t particularly subtle , this was plenty of time to follow even its most involved plotlines—such as when Reva Shayne , a nine-times-married character who had arcs as a talk-show host , a psychic , the princess of a fictional island , and a time traveller to the Civil War and Nazi @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a devious clone that her most recent husband had made of her in order to spare her children from grief during the most recent of her presumed deaths .
“ Guiding Light ” began , in 1937 , as a radio show to promote a soap called Duz .
( “ Duz does everything.
” ) When it went off the air , in 2009 , it was the longest-running show in broadcast history .
It was owned , until the end , not by CBS but by Procter & Gamble , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been credited with inventing modern advertising in America .
In addition to promoting its brands with paintings on trolley cars and billboards , the company developed more than twenty radio and television dramas .
The first , “ Oxydol ’ s Own Ma Perkins , ” premièred in 1933 ; the last , “ As The World Turns , ” left the airwaves in 2010 , by which time the term “ soap opera ” had become freestanding .
You could even watch them , as I did , without ever knowing they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ company .
It was easy , until the COVID-19 outbreak , not to think very often or very deeply about soap .
Early in the pandemic , this began to change .
We learned which pop songs had choruses that we could sing to keep us scrubbing for a full twenty seconds ; we learned that , at least during the pre-lockdown period , the lines outside men ’ s rooms grew suddenly longer—likely because ( according to one study ) only thirty-one per cent of men had previously been in the habit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ bathroom .
As distilleries and breweries pivoted to producing hand sanitizer , the Times ran a piece explaining why old-fashioned soap was actually better at destroying the coronavirus : the hydrophobic tails of soap molecules bond with the lipid membrane that protects the virus , literally ripping it apart , while their hydrophilic heads bond with the water that washes the dead virus away .
Like many people , I developed a new appreciation for soap , imagining with grim satisfaction a scene of microscopic destruction each time I scrubbed my hands .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be reading a book by a medical doctor which takes a critical view of the soap industry and begins with the sentence “ Five years ago , I stopped showering.
” Let me clarify at once that James Hamblin , a staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of “ Clean : The New Science of Skin ” ( Riverhead ) , is still an advocate of regular handwashing , indisputably a world-changing innovation in public health , and of especially crucial importance at this moment in history .
( Hamblin @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wear a white coat two days in a row without cleaning it.
” ) But he ’ s doubtful about all the scrubbing and soaping—not to mention moisturizing and deodorizing and serum-and-acid application—to which we subject the rest of our body ’ s largest organ , and about the companies that spend a lot of money to convince us that we must do so to be clean .
Soap is an ancient invention , so old that we can only assume it was the lucky result of animal fat spilling into fire ash @ @ @ @ @ @ @ notice the cleaning power of the resulting lather .
Still , early versions , made with lye , could burn skin , and were used more often for laundry than for people .
Bathing more commonly involved water , sand , pumice , scrapers , and oils or perfumes—though in certain places the whole notion was seen as dangerous .
Some historical records suggest that washing was comparatively rare in the Western world : Marco Polo wrote of his surprise at how frequently people in India and China bathed , and Ahmad ibn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Baghdad to the Volga River in the early tenth century , wrote that the people he met on his journey did not wash after eating , shitting , peeing , or having sex , and were “ the filthiest of Allah ’ s creatures.
” The French historian Jules Michelet described the European Middle Ages as “ a thousand years without a bath.
” In America , soap made for skin became commonly sold only in the nineteenth century , largely as a way to make money from the leftovers of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of unused animal fat .
Entrepreneurs added potash and made soap , for which they then needed to create public demand .
These early “ soapers ” included William Procter and James Gamble , who began working together after marrying a pair of sisters ; another familial pair , whose company name eventually changed from Lever Brothers to Unilever ; and a man named William Wrigley , Jr. , who gave away chewing gum as a promotion for his soap , but found that the gum was in higher demand .
Last year @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was valued at nearly a hundred billion dollars , which makes it hard to imagine a time when people had to be persuaded to use soap .
But the soap industry , Hamblin argues , serves as an effective introduction to the history of American marketing .
Early soap companies pioneered many techniques that we still see today : a single company owning lots of competing brands with nearly identical products , in order to foster feelings of consumer choice and loyalty ; the use of “ sponsored content , ” such as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s “ How to Bring Up a Baby , ” which was part health pamphlet and part advertisement .
The ad campaigns created a sense of lurking danger in the competition by claiming that their own products were safer and purer , or they promoted , as product virtues , obscure , jargony terms ( “ triple milled ” ) that consumers assumed to be important simply because they were touted on a package .
The companies leaned , not at all subtly , on racism and classism to sell their products @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now be called influencers , such as the film stars who appeared in “ 9 out of 10 screen stars use Lux Toilet Soap ” ads .
“ Lever never even paid them , ” Hamblin writes , “ and the practice being so new , the stars apparently didn ’ t think to ask.
” The other innovation was to create , and then meet , needs that people didn ’ t know they had .
Hamblin notes that “ B.O.
” began as a marketing term , and that many soaps @ @ @ @ @ @ @ antibacterial ” were less safe than standard soap , leaving behind dangerous compounds .
( Many products that we now think of as soaps are actually detergents , made from synthetic compounds . )
Meanwhile , soap companies , in order to expand their product lines , “ had to sell the idea that soap was insufficient on its own—or that its effects had to be undone by yet more products , ” Hamblin writes .
You needed separate soaps for your hair , your body , your face , and even for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Albert Einstein , asked why he didn ’ t use shaving cream , then newly invented , is reported to have replied , “ Two soaps ?
That is too complicated !
” ) To offset the drying effects of soap , you then needed other products—conditioners , moisturizers , toners .
Hamblin identifies the 1957 introduction of Dove , whose cleaning power is reduced because it ’ s mixed with moisturizer , as the moment when the industry started moving toward selling a product that would do nothing at all .

When my sister and I were young, we liked to come home from school and turn on “Guiding Light,” a soap opera on CBS. We only ever caught the last fifteen minutes of the hour-long show, but, because it wasn’t particularly subtle, this was plenty of time to follow even its most involved plotlines—such as when Reva Shayne, a nine-times-married character who had arcs as a talk-show host, a psychic, the princess of a fictional island, and a time traveller to the Civil War and Nazi Germany, had to fight Dolly, a devious clone that her most recent husband had made of her in order to spare her children from grief during the most recent of her presumed deaths.
“Guiding Light” began, in 1937, as a radio show to promote a soap called Duz. (“Duz does everything.”) When it went off the air, in 2009, it was the longest-running show in broadcast history. It was owned, until the end, not by CBS but by Procter & Gamble, which began as a soap company and has been credited with inventing modern advertising in America. In addition to promoting its brands with paintings on trolley cars and billboards, the company developed more than twenty radio and television dramas. The first, “Oxydol’s Own Ma Perkins,” premièred in 1933; the last, “As The World Turns,” left the airwaves in 2010, by which time the term “soap opera” had become freestanding. You could even watch them, as I did, without ever knowing they had anything to do with a soap company.
It was easy, until the COVID-19 outbreak, not to think very often or very deeply about soap. Early in the pandemic, this began to change. We learned which pop songs had choruses that we could sing to keep us scrubbing for a full twenty seconds; we learned that, at least during the pre-lockdown period, the lines outside men’s rooms grew suddenly longer—likely because (according to one study) only thirty-one per cent of men had previously been in the habit of washing their hands after using the bathroom. As distilleries and breweries pivoted to producing hand sanitizer, the Times ran a piece explaining why old-fashioned soap was actually better at destroying the coronavirus: the hydrophobic tails of soap molecules bond with the lipid membrane that protects the virus, literally ripping it apart, while their hydrophilic heads bond with the water that washes the dead virus away. Like many people, I developed a new appreciation for soap, imagining with grim satisfaction a scene of microscopic destruction each time I scrubbed my hands.
So this has been a strange time to be reading a book by a medical doctor which takes a critical view of the soap industry and begins with the sentence “Five years ago, I stopped showering.”
Let me clarify at once that James Hamblin, a staff writer at The Atlantic and the author of “Clean: The New Science of Skin” (Riverhead), is still an advocate of regular handwashing, indisputably a world-changing innovation in public health, and of especially crucial importance at this moment in history. (Hamblin also writes that he “would never wear a white coat two days in a row without cleaning it.”) But he’s doubtful about all the scrubbing and soaping—not to mention moisturizing and deodorizing and serum-and-acid application—to which we subject the rest of our body’s largest organ, and about the companies that spend a lot of money to convince us that we must do so to be clean.
Soap is an ancient invention, so old that we can only assume it was the lucky result of animal fat spilling into fire ash and some people being alert enough to notice the cleaning power of the resulting lather. Still, early versions, made with lye, could burn skin, and were used more often for laundry than for people. Bathing more commonly involved water, sand, pumice, scrapers, and oils or perfumes—though in certain places the whole notion was seen as dangerous. Some historical records suggest that washing was comparatively rare in the Western world: Marco Polo wrote of his surprise at how frequently people in India and China bathed, and Ahmad ibn Fadlan, who travelled from the court of Baghdad to the Volga River in the early tenth century, wrote that the people he met on his journey did not wash after eating, shitting, peeing, or having sex, and were “the filthiest of Allah’s creatures.” The French historian Jules Michelet described the European Middle Ages as “a thousand years without a bath.”
In America, soap made for skin became commonly sold only in the nineteenth century, largely as a way to make money from the leftovers of the meatpacking industry, which produced large quantities of unused animal fat. Entrepreneurs added potash and made soap, for which they then needed to create public demand. These early “soapers” included William Procter and James Gamble, who began working together after marrying a pair of sisters; another familial pair, whose company name eventually changed from Lever Brothers to Unilever; and a man named William Wrigley, Jr., who gave away chewing gum as a promotion for his soap, but found that the gum was in higher demand.
Last year, the beauty-and-personal-care market in the U.S. was valued at nearly a hundred billion dollars, which makes it hard to imagine a time when people had to be persuaded to use soap. But the soap industry, Hamblin argues, serves as an effective introduction to the history of American marketing. Early soap companies pioneered many techniques that we still see today: a single company owning lots of competing brands with nearly identical products, in order to foster feelings of consumer choice and loyalty; the use of “sponsored content,” such as the soap operas or Procter & Gamble’s “How to Bring Up a Baby,” which was part health pamphlet and part advertisement. The ad campaigns created a sense of lurking danger in the competition by claiming that their own products were safer and purer, or they promoted, as product virtues, obscure, jargony terms (“triple milled”) that consumers assumed to be important simply because they were touted on a package. The companies leaned, not at all subtly, on racism and classism to sell their products. They even used people who would now be called influencers, such as the film stars who appeared in “9 out of 10 screen stars use Lux Toilet Soap” ads. “Lever never even paid them,” Hamblin writes, “and the practice being so new, the stars apparently didn’t think to ask.”
The other innovation was to create, and then meet, needs that people didn’t know they had. Hamblin notes that “B.O.” began as a marketing term, and that many soaps advertised as “antimicrobial” and “antibacterial” were less safe than standard soap, leaving behind dangerous compounds. (Many products that we now think of as soaps are actually detergents, made from synthetic compounds.)
Meanwhile, soap companies, in order to expand their product lines, “had to sell the idea that soap was insufficient on its own—or that its effects had to be undone by yet more products,” Hamblin writes. You needed separate soaps for your hair, your body, your face, and even for different members of a family. (Albert Einstein, asked why he didn’t use shaving cream, then newly invented, is reported to have replied, “Two soaps? That is too complicated!”) To offset the drying effects of soap, you then needed other products—conditioners, moisturizers, toners. Hamblin identifies the 1957 introduction of Dove, whose cleaning power is reduced because it’s mixed with moisturizer, as the moment when the industry started moving toward selling a product that would do nothing at all.
Hamblin’s decision to stop showering—he occasionally rinses—began as an experiment, as he started to question what he’d assumed to be the essentials of his life. He sold his car, cancelled his Internet, and, until his girlfriend objected, considered living in a van. But it also reflected a new understanding of how our skin functions: as a living, permeable “dynamic interface” that connects us to the world around us—“a complex, diverse ecosystem” rather than a barrier that should be sterile and pristine. Soap, he reasoned, washes away not only natural oils but also many of the microorganisms that make our skin their home, disrupting the natural balance they might otherwise achieve.
Hamblin embarks on a rather disjointed and sometimes unsatisfying series of adventures meant to question what it means to be clean. He visits the Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps factory, gets a fancy facial, and attends the opening of a Glossier store and various product expos. One salesperson pours soap for men into shot glasses from what looks like a whiskey bottle; another tries to sell him a “fountain of youth stem cell moisturizer,” in which the stem cells come from pumpkins. In an effort to show how laxly we regulate the ingredients in cosmetics—fifteen hundred chemicals are banned or restricted in personal-care products in the E.U., compared with only eleven in the United States—he starts his own skin-care company. It’s called Brunson + Sterling (the motto: “Menscare for Fucking Perfect Skin”) and offers a mix of random ingredients in two-ounce bottles for two hundred dollars each. The product doesn’t sell, but it is legal.
Most interestingly, Hamblin meets people who take a very different view of what skin care means. One woman afflicted with acne tried everything from scrubbing to antibiotics, Accutane, and hormonal birth control. (Caused in part by Cutibacterium acnes, acne is one of the most common reasons for antibiotic prescriptions.) Things only got worse, until she gave up, stopped doing anything, and found her skin clearing. Sandy Skotnicki, a Canadian dermatologist, spends her winters begging itchy men to stop using shower gel and wonders if the twinned increases in over-washing and in eczema are more than just correlation. (Because Skotnicki’s patients want to be prescribed something, Hamblin writes, she “has found a way to turn something into nothing,” by advocating regimented cleanses—by which she just means breaks from cleansing products.) Some scientists find that symptoms of eczema—which often involve an overabundance of Staphylococcus aureus—can be treated with the application of a different bacteria.
Hamblin interviews experts in immunology and microbiology who worry that, for some of us, humanity’s long-standing problem with hygiene has now reversed itself: instead of too little, we may have too much of it. These experts want us to think of hygiene more expansively—as a matter of health and balance, rather than one of sterility and purity. With all our soaps and sanitizers and antibiotics, in addition to so much time spent inside, away from dirt and animals and fresh air, we’ve created new problems for our immune systems, which miss out on the chance to encounter benign triggers and instead learn to overreact to perceived threats. Excess hygiene can also be a problem for the skin’s microbiome, which has an ecology that we’re just beginning to understand. Mark Holbreich, an allergist in Indiana, found that the Amish have notably low levels of allergies, eczema, and other skin problems, even when compared to genetically and culturally related groups, including Hutterites in South Dakota, whose children are generally raised farther from their farms. Julie Segre, who published the first maps of the bacterial and fungal diversity of human skin, notes that the recent fascination with probiotics in food doesn’t seem to have affected our thinking about skin health: “Everyone wants to eat Activia yogurt and colonize themselves with bacteria, and then they want to use Purell.” And Jack Gilbert, a microbiologist, greets Hamblin with a nonstandard hello: “So, I shower. I do shower, though I know the implications of it. Not every day, and I don’t tend to use a lot of soap when I do.”
Medical textbooks are commonly illustrated with what are known as écorché figures—human anatomies of the type sketched by Leonardo da Vinci, their skin removed to better show the muscle and bone beneath. Monty Lyman, a dermatologist, believes that this reveals a failure of the medical establishment: regularly overlooking the medical importance of the skin, which serves as both wall and window between us humans and the outside world. He knows specialists in more glamorous fields who scoff at dermatology. (A surgeon friend tells him, grotesquely, that “the skin is the wrapping paper that covers the presents.”) In “The Remarkable Life of the Skin” (Atlantic Monthly Press), Lyman’s goal is to push back: to teach readers to appreciate an organ that is often “invisible in plain sight. ”
Skin is a strange little miracle. Were it removed, you would quickly lose the water in your body and die of dehydration. It protects you from deadly radiation and pathogens and helps you stay within the narrow temperature spectrum your body can tolerate, yet it is, at its thinnest, half the width of a penny. And the cells with which it faces the world are already effectively dead, and will, in general, last no longer than a month—a million or so are shed each day, filling your house with dust. As these skin cells are lost, they are replaced with new ones, taking their own self-sacrificial turn at the barricades to protect the trillions of other cells of which you are made. “Never was so much owed by so many to so few, ” Lyman writes.


newyorker--2020-07-27--Who Is Kanye’s Running Mate?

Who Is Kanye’s Running Mate?

Bill Garlow , the great-grandson of Buffalo Bill Cody , owns two Best Western hotels in Cody , Wyoming .
In June , Garlow , who is seventy-eight , found himself sitting in his office across from Kanye West—a Cody resident since 2019—along with West ’ s cousin and a Yeezy employee .
None of them wore masks .
“ Kanye kept saying , ‘ Best .
.
.
West .
.
.
ern , ’ ” Lindsay Garlow , Bill ’ s daughter , who ’ d sat in on the meeting , recalled .
“ He didn ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a chain of international hotels.
” West loved the name—and he thought her dad had come up with it .
The group spoke for an hour .
“ They were on their phones the entire time , texting , ” she said .
“ As a teacher , that drives me batshit crazy.
” Eventually , Bill cleared his throat , and West looked up .
“ He wanted to talk to Dad about hospitality , ” Lindsay said , “ but we weren ’ t sure where he was going with that.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ he removed one of his Yeezy shoes and passed it across the desk to Bill .
“ It was weird , ” Lindsay said .
She noted her dad ’ s poor health , adding , “ I told him to wash up when Kanye left.
” West had spoken to them about his love of Jesus and his idolization of Donald Trump .
But he had said little about his Presidential campaign , which he would announce a week later— “ Other than a sentence that began , ‘ When I am @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The Garlows Googled his platform .
It includes , as a coronavirus measure , “ Stop making God mad.
” West is also anti-Planned Parenthood and anti-Black History Month .
( At a campaign stop in Charleston , West said , to boos , that Harriet Tubman “ never actually freed the slaves.
” ) The Garlows plan to vote for Joe Biden .
“ But if it were Kanye versus Trump , I ’ d vote Kanye , ” Lindsay said .
“ He ’ s kinder .
And he ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” with friends and associates .
Her father added , “ I have half his business .
I ’ d like all of it.
” Unlike Biden , West has announced his running mate : Michelle Tidball , a fifty-seven-year-old white woman from Cody who runs an online Bible study , works in a dental office , and has so far said nothing public about the campaign .
To find out more about her , Lindsay Garlow suggested calling Mary L. Keller , a scholar of religious studies at the University of Wyoming @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the early eighties .
“ Michelle was the bubbly , charismatic cheerleader , ” Keller said .
And she ’ s smart .
“ I think she knows Hebrew pretty well.
” In 2016 , the two women ran a youth group together , and Tidball had talked about her role as an “ online prophet.
” “ We went out for drinks , and she told me about this international group of people who are in touch with the divine and discuss it with each other , ” Keller recalled .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ d predicted Trump ’ s victory .
Keller laughed at the memory .
“ To her , his election was evidence.
” When Keller heard about West choosing Tidball , she said , “ it made sense .
They both believe they have direct access to God and read the world as evidence of that access.
” She figured they ’ d probably met through Tidball ’ s online prophet network .
“ The religious imagination is about the only thing that can provide language for drought , flood , fire , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ I see Kanye and Michelle as the kinds of voices that people might turn to for a meaningful story in the face of climate change.
” She added , “ We ’ d all be safer with Michelle next to Kanye than we are with Pence next to Trump.
” One local Tidball booster , Wallace Johnson , is a retired lawyer and a former special assistant to Richard Nixon .
Years ago , he hired Tidball to run a mentoring program .
She was “ great with the kids , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ patient at her dental office : “ I saw her there just before Kanye ’ s announcement.
” He wasn ’ t sure where she and West had met .
Maybe an airport lounge ?
“ Michelle has spent considerable time studying the Torah , and I ’ m sure he picked up on that , ” Johnson went on .
“ She ’ s a wise pick : extremely articulate , likable , and capable .
As far from Sarah Palin as I can imagine.
” He added , “ I never @ @ @ @ @ @ @ own , but maybe he ’ s developing one .
I don ’ t want to call it a cult , but that ’ s what a new religion is .
Michelle could help with that .
She ’ s very persuasive.
” Starting a religion is easier than running for President .
Recently , West tweeted that he may push his run to 2024 .
“ I don ’ t think we ’ re about to say that the forty-sixth President lives here in Cody , ” Johnson said .
“ Maybe @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” ♦

Kanye West and Michelle Tidball Illustration by João Fazenda
Bill Garlow, the great-grandson of Buffalo Bill Cody, owns two Best Western hotels in Cody, Wyoming. In June, Garlow, who is seventy-eight, found himself sitting in his office across from Kanye West—a Cody resident since 2019—along with West’s cousin and a Yeezy employee. None of them wore masks. “Kanye kept saying, ‘Best. . . West. . . ern,’ ” Lindsay Garlow, Bill’s daughter, who’d sat in on the meeting, recalled. “He didn’t seem to know that it was a chain of international hotels.” West loved the name—and he thought her dad had come up with it. The group spoke for an hour. “They were on their phones the entire time, texting,” she said. “As a teacher, that drives me batshit crazy.” Eventually, Bill cleared his throat, and West looked up. “He wanted to talk to Dad about hospitality,” Lindsay said, “but we weren’t sure where he was going with that.” West further confused the Garlows when he removed one of his Yeezy shoes and passed it across the desk to Bill. “It was weird,” Lindsay said. She noted her dad’s poor health, adding, “I told him to wash up when Kanye left.”
West had spoken to them about his love of Jesus and his idolization of Donald Trump. But he had said little about his Presidential campaign, which he would announce a week later—“Other than a sentence that began, ‘When I am President,’ ” Lindsay said. The Garlows Googled his platform. It includes, as a coronavirus measure, “Stop making God mad.” West is also anti-Planned Parenthood and anti-Black History Month. (At a campaign stop in Charleston, West said, to boos, that Harriet Tubman “never actually freed the slaves.”) The Garlows plan to vote for Joe Biden. “But if it were Kanye versus Trump, I’d vote Kanye,” Lindsay said. “He’s kinder. And he’s been booking us full since January,” with friends and associates. Her father added, “I have half his business. I’d like all of it.”
Unlike Biden, West has announced his running mate: Michelle Tidball, a fifty-seven-year-old white woman from Cody who runs an online Bible study, works in a dental office, and has so far said nothing public about the campaign. To find out more about her, Lindsay Garlow suggested calling Mary L. Keller, a scholar of religious studies at the University of Wyoming. Keller and Tidball attended Cody High in the early eighties. “Michelle was the bubbly, charismatic cheerleader,” Keller said. And she’s smart. “I think she knows Hebrew pretty well.” In 2016, the two women ran a youth group together, and Tidball had talked about her role as an “online prophet.” “We went out for drinks, and she told me about this international group of people who are in touch with the divine and discuss it with each other,” Keller recalled. Tidball also told her that they’d predicted Trump’s victory. Keller laughed at the memory. “To her, his election was evidence.”
When Keller heard about West choosing Tidball, she said, “it made sense. They both believe they have direct access to God and read the world as evidence of that access.” She figured they’d probably met through Tidball’s online prophet network. “The religious imagination is about the only thing that can provide language for drought, flood, fire,” she said, noting an upside. “I see Kanye and Michelle as the kinds of voices that people might turn to for a meaningful story in the face of climate change.” She added, “We’d all be safer with Michelle next to Kanye than we are with Pence next to Trump.”
One local Tidball booster, Wallace Johnson, is a retired lawyer and a former special assistant to Richard Nixon. Years ago, he hired Tidball to run a mentoring program. She was “great with the kids,” he said. He is also a patient at her dental office: “I saw her there just before Kanye’s announcement.” He wasn’t sure where she and West had met. Maybe an airport lounge? “Michelle has spent considerable time studying the Torah, and I’m sure he picked up on that,” Johnson went on. “She’s a wise pick: extremely articulate, likable, and capable. As far from Sarah Palin as I can imagine.” He added, “I never thought Kanye had a theology of his own, but maybe he’s developing one. I don’t want to call it a cult, but that’s what a new religion is. Michelle could help with that. She’s very persuasive.” Starting a religion is easier than running for President. Recently, West tweeted that he may push his run to 2024. “I don’t think we’re about to say that the forty-sixth President lives here in Cody,” Johnson said. “Maybe in four years, but not now.” ♦


newyorker--2020-07-27--Urgent Care from the Army Corps of Engineers

The commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is Todd Semonite , a stocky three-star general who recently turned sixty-three .
Every workday for the past forty-one years , he has served in uniform .
On his left wrist is a FitBit ; on his right , the kind of Casio calculator watch that he has worn since he was a teen-ager .
In high school , in Vermont , Semonite wasn ’ t the biggest guy on the football team , but he played varsity center ; he told a newspaper that size is “ not really a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and his wife , Connie , live in Washington , D.C. , at Fort McNair .
On weekends , they renovate foreclosed houses and flip them .
They have four children , all of them grown ; Semonite , a civil engineer , made cradles for his grandchildren in his woodworking shop .
“ I mass-produced ’ em , ” he told me , explaining that he would cut the slats and the rockers ahead of time and assemble them once a baby was born .
George Washington created the position of chief @ @ @ @ @ @ @ War , to oversee the design and construction of military batteries and fortifications .
The Corps was formally established in 1802 .
Combat engineers solve problems through math and physics : they move troops ( build the bridge ) and protect them from attack ( blow up the bridge ) .
The military runs the Corps , but ninety-eight per cent of the agency ’ s thirty-six thousand employees are civilians : geographers , biologists , ecologists , architects .
The magazine Undark recently noted that the Corps , which operates under the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fingers in everything from snowmelt modeling and wetlands plant inventories to research on stealth aircraft.
” The Corps calls itself one of the world ’ s largest public engineering , design , and construction-management firms .
The agency , whose symbol is a castle , built the Pentagon , the Washington Monument , and the Library of Congress .
The Corps also manages a vast network of waterways .
This time of year—natural-disaster season—there is always a dam to fortify and debris to clear ; sandbags don ’ t stack themselves .
Like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had notable failures : the levees in New Orleans , which the engineers maintain , broke during Hurricane Katrina .
And the Corps has been accused of mismanagement and bloat .
In the early two-thousands , critics cited an investigation by the Army ’ s inspector general , which found that the Corps had manipulated economic data to justify costly projects on the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers .
On “ The Daily Show , ” Trevor Noah called the Corps “ the place to go if you want something built—even if no one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of his career in the Corps , leaving it briefly for a combat tour in Afghanistan : in 2014 , he took over a leadership position after Major General Harold Greene , a friend , was killed when an Afghan soldier opened fire at a construction site in Kabul .
Semonite supervised the training of the Afghan National Army and worked to prevent corruption by withholding financial aid from government ministries unless they met strict conditions .
He once said that he wanted his legacy in Afghanistan to be not “ guns and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Semonite was named chief engineer in 2016 , by President Barack Obama .
He set out to “ revolutionize ” Corps operations , imposing , among other things , tighter deadlines on projects .
Because Congress funded certain jobs incrementally , work that should be completed in three years could end up taking twelve .
Semonite told me he decided that “ we can ’ t afford to have so much different red tape.
” He demanded work of “ exceptional quality , ” produced “ on time and on budget.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Maria devastated Puerto Rico , the Corps was denounced for being too slow to restore the decimated power grid .
Semonite told reporters that the agency was facing a “ massive logistics challenge , ” including the transport , the installation , and the wiring of sixty-two thousand utility poles , often on mountainous terrain ; if moving faster were possible , he added , “ we would be doing it.
” These criticisms left Semonite with what a colleague described as something close to “ scar tissue.
” He thought of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people ” singularly capable of solving the “ toughest engineering problems.
” Semonite ’ s vision is driven more by what he calls a spirit of “ ruthless execution ” than by design theory : he will never be caught asking a brick , Louis Kahn-like , “ what it wanted to be.
” The Corps ’ s motto is the French term Essayons— “ Let us try.
” Semonite ’ s mantra is “ Deliver the program.
” And so this past spring , when COVID-19 overran the United States , Semonite @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
He told me , “ America needs a capability to step up when something gets really , really hard.
” On March 13th , President Donald Trump declared a national emergency , unlocking billions of dollars in coronavirus aid .
Two days later , New York ’ s governor , Andrew Cuomo , published an open letter to Trump , saying that , without “ immediate action , the imminent failure of hospital systems is all but certain.
” Seven hundred and twenty-nine New Yorkers had tested positive for COVID-19 , three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were soaring .
The state had fifty-three thousand hospital beds in its inventory but expected to need more than twice that number by mid-April .
The problem was particularly acute in New York City .
Cuomo envisaged “ people on gurneys in hallways.
” During a national crisis , Semonite likes to say , the Corps works as “ FEMA ’ s engineer ” : FEMA authorizes certain missions and pays at least seventy-five per cent of the expenses .
Cuomo , in his letter , asked Trump to send in the Corps @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , March 18th , Semonite flew to Albany , in a small jet belonging to the Pentagon .
He was joined by Anthony Travia , a division chief at Huntsville Center , a Corps research-and-engineering hub in Alabama that was initially established during the Cold War , to develop missile-defense technologies .
The unit headed by Travia builds military medical facilities .
He once worked as the chief engineer of a major Veterans Administration hospital in Chicago , where the staff drilled for scenarios involving Ebola , H1N1 , SARS , MERS , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We were the hospital that stayed open if something horrible happened , ” he told me .
Semonite had asked Huntsville Center engineers to draft a plan to “ stand up ” alternate care facilities as a relief valve for hospitals overwhelmed by the coronavirus .
Colloquially , these were being called “ field hospitals , ” but this was inaccurate : a hospital offers such specialty services as surgery .
Building a hospital takes years .
Huntsville Center ’ s engineers had devised a quicker solution : convert existing structures .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s team presented a proposal that had been prepared almost overnight .
The engineers asked the Governor to picture a budget hotel—say , a La Quinta Inn—with infrastructure that could be instantly marshalled : electricity , water , ice machines , showers , phones , Wi-Fi , laundry .
A nurse-call system could be installed .
The front desk could become patient reception .
Each guest room could accommodate a patient and equipment , including a ventilator .
The carpet would have to go—fabric collects bacteria .
The sickest COVID-19 patients require @ @ @ @ @ @ @ via individual cylinders or through a manifold system in which gas is piped to various beds from an exterior tank of liquid oxygen .
Rooms could be retrofitted with negative pressure—to control the spread of pathogens—by adjusting H.V.A.C .
units and baffling doors .
Negative pressure works much like a chimney flue : air is drawn out of a room in a single direction and passes through a heavy-duty filter .
When Cuomo asked about staffing and supplies , Semonite explained that the Corps ’ s job was to produce “ the box @ @ @ @ @ @ @ local government ’ s responsibility to decide how and when to use it .
On Thursday , Corps engineers and New York State officials visited about two dozen potential sites .
On Friday , they assessed each venue in detail .
The hotel idea was discarded , in part because negotiations over private property can be complicated .
( One of the state officials said , “ How many La Quintas you think we ’ ve got in Manhattan ?
” ) The Jacob K. Javits Center , a convention hall overlooking the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the list : the facility has two million square feet of floor space , and the state owns it .

The commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is Todd Semonite, a stocky three-star general who recently turned sixty-three. Every workday for the past forty-one years, he has served in uniform. On his left wrist is a FitBit; on his right, the kind of Casio calculator watch that he has worn since he was a teen-ager. In high school, in Vermont, Semonite wasn’t the biggest guy on the football team, but he played varsity center; he told a newspaper that size is “not really a disadvantage if you work hard.” Semonite and his wife, Connie, live in Washington, D.C., at Fort McNair. On weekends, they renovate foreclosed houses and flip them. They have four children, all of them grown; Semonite, a civil engineer, made cradles for his grandchildren in his woodworking shop. “I mass-produced ’em,” he told me, explaining that he would cut the slats and the rockers ahead of time and assemble them once a baby was born.
George Washington created the position of chief engineer at the outset of the Revolutionary War, to oversee the design and construction of military batteries and fortifications. The Corps was formally established in 1802. Combat engineers solve problems through math and physics: they move troops (build the bridge) and protect them from attack (blow up the bridge). The military runs the Corps, but ninety-eight per cent of the agency’s thirty-six thousand employees are civilians: geographers, biologists, ecologists, architects. The magazine Undark recently noted that the Corps, which operates under the Department of Defense, “has its fingers in everything from snowmelt modeling and wetlands plant inventories to research on stealth aircraft.”
The Corps calls itself one of the world’s largest public engineering, design, and construction-management firms. The agency, whose symbol is a castle, built the Pentagon, the Washington Monument, and the Library of Congress. The Corps also manages a vast network of waterways. This time of year—natural-disaster season—there is always a dam to fortify and debris to clear; sandbags don’t stack themselves.
Like many government agencies, the Corps has had notable failures: the levees in New Orleans, which the engineers maintain, broke during Hurricane Katrina. And the Corps has been accused of mismanagement and bloat. In the early two-thousands, critics cited an investigation by the Army’s inspector general, which found that the Corps had manipulated economic data to justify costly projects on the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers. On “The Daily Show,” Trevor Noah called the Corps “the place to go if you want something built—even if no one needs it.”
Semonite has spent most of his career in the Corps, leaving it briefly for a combat tour in Afghanistan: in 2014, he took over a leadership position after Major General Harold Greene, a friend, was killed when an Afghan soldier opened fire at a construction site in Kabul. Semonite supervised the training of the Afghan National Army and worked to prevent corruption by withholding financial aid from government ministries unless they met strict conditions. He once said that he wanted his legacy in Afghanistan to be not “guns and ammo” but “processes and systems.”
Semonite was named chief engineer in 2016, by President Barack Obama. He set out to “revolutionize” Corps operations, imposing, among other things, tighter deadlines on projects. Because Congress funded certain jobs incrementally, work that should be completed in three years could end up taking twelve. Semonite told me he decided that “we can’t afford to have so much different red tape.” He demanded work of “exceptional quality,” produced “on time and on budget.”
Still, in 2017, after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, the Corps was denounced for being too slow to restore the decimated power grid. Semonite told reporters that the agency was facing a “massive logistics challenge,” including the transport, the installation, and the wiring of sixty-two thousand utility poles, often on mountainous terrain; if moving faster were possible, he added, “we would be doing it.”
These criticisms left Semonite with what a colleague described as something close to “scar tissue.” He thought of the Corps as a “bunch of expeditionary people” singularly capable of solving the “toughest engineering problems.” Semonite’s vision is driven more by what he calls a spirit of “ruthless execution” than by design theory: he will never be caught asking a brick, Louis Kahn-like, “what it wanted to be.” The Corps’s motto is the French term Essayons—“Let us try.” Semonite’s mantra is “Deliver the program.” And so this past spring, when COVID-19 overran the United States, Semonite was determined to provide vital infrastructure quickly. He told me, “America needs a capability to step up when something gets really, really hard.”
On March 13th, President Donald Trump declared a national emergency, unlocking billions of dollars in coronavirus aid. Two days later, New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, published an open letter to Trump, saying that, without “immediate action, the imminent failure of hospital systems is all but certain.” Seven hundred and twenty-nine New Yorkers had tested positive for COVID-19, three had died, and hospitalizations and intubations were soaring. The state had fifty-three thousand hospital beds in its inventory but expected to need more than twice that number by mid-April. The problem was particularly acute in New York City. Cuomo envisaged “people on gurneys in hallways.”
During a national crisis, Semonite likes to say, the Corps works as “FEMA’s engineer”: FEMA authorizes certain missions and pays at least seventy-five per cent of the expenses. Cuomo, in his letter, asked Trump to send in the Corps to expand hospital-bed space. On Wednesday, March 18th, Semonite flew to Albany, in a small jet belonging to the Pentagon. He was joined by Anthony Travia, a division chief at Huntsville Center, a Corps research-and-engineering hub in Alabama that was initially established during the Cold War, to develop missile-defense technologies. The unit headed by Travia builds military medical facilities. He once worked as the chief engineer of a major Veterans Administration hospital in Chicago, where the staff drilled for scenarios involving Ebola, H1N1, SARS, MERS, natural disasters, and terror attacks. “We were the hospital that stayed open if something horrible happened,” he told me.
Semonite had asked Huntsville Center engineers to draft a plan to “stand up” alternate care facilities as a relief valve for hospitals overwhelmed by the coronavirus. Colloquially, these were being called “field hospitals,” but this was inaccurate: a hospital offers such specialty services as surgery. Building a hospital takes years. Huntsville Center’s engineers had devised a quicker solution: convert existing structures. At Cuomo’s office, Semonite’s team presented a proposal that had been prepared almost overnight. The engineers asked the Governor to picture a budget hotel—say, a La Quinta Inn—with infrastructure that could be instantly marshalled: electricity, water, ice machines, showers, phones, Wi-Fi, laundry. A nurse-call system could be installed. The front desk could become patient reception. Each guest room could accommodate a patient and equipment, including a ventilator. The carpet would have to go—fabric collects bacteria. The sickest COVID-19 patients require abundant oxygen, which could be delivered via individual cylinders or through a manifold system in which gas is piped to various beds from an exterior tank of liquid oxygen. Rooms could be retrofitted with negative pressure—to control the spread of pathogens—by adjusting H.V.A.C. units and baffling doors. Negative pressure works much like a chimney flue: air is drawn out of a room in a single direction and passes through a heavy-duty filter. When Cuomo asked about staffing and supplies, Semonite explained that the Corps’s job was to produce “the box”—it was then the state or local government’s responsibility to decide how and when to use it.
Cartoon by Liana Finck Copy link to cartoon Copy link to cartoon Shop Shop
On Thursday, Corps engineers and New York State officials visited about two dozen potential sites. On Friday, they assessed each venue in detail. The hotel idea was discarded, in part because negotiations over private property can be complicated. (One of the state officials said, “How many La Quintas you think we’ve got in Manhattan?”) The Jacob K. Javits Center, a convention hall overlooking the Hudson, rose to the top of the list: the facility has two million square feet of floor space, and the state owns it.
Cuomo thought of the pandemic as “one of those moments of true crisis and confusion,” like 9/11. Trump had delayed taking federal action, forcing states to compete for ventilators and for personal protective equipment, which wasted crucial time. Two days in a row in March, as the pandemic worsened, the President golfed. (In the U.S., approximately a hundred and forty thousand people have now died of COVID-19.) When Americans’ “whole concept of life and society” was shaken, Cuomo said, they needed “to see government perform at its best.”
The Corps stood up Javits in four days. This was possible, in part, because the military sent medical units—doctors, nurses, pharmacists, and lab techs who could attend to hundreds of patients. Truckloads of supplies arrived hourly. Corps engineers were trying to figure out how best to partition Javits’s vast floor space when someone realized that they could erect the portable walls that were ordinarily used in the hall to create ten-by-ten-foot vender booths. Nearly a thousand cots appeared in nearly a thousand cubicles. Once built out, the floor resembled a trade-show arena, except for the privacy curtain across each cubicle’s entrance. Medical personnel arrived from Army bases as far away as Texas. New York National Guard members who days earlier were, say, practicing dentistry in Saratoga Springs coördinated P.P.E. fittings and the assembly of floor lamps.
Initially, the state conceived of an alternate care facility as a place to treat patients who didn’t have the coronavirus, allowing hospitals to focus on COVID-19. But to everyone’s surprise the number of non-COVID hospitalizations plummeted; fewer people were getting shot or being injured in accidents, and many elective surgeries were postponed. Javits ultimately had room for twenty-five hundred patients but sat largely empty, even as city hospitals experienced crushing surges and trailer morgues filled up with the bodies of the dead. In early April, as New York hurtled toward its spring peak, Cuomo switched Javits from “non-COVID” to “COVID” status, calling in the Corps for an immediate upgrade.
The Corps tends to respond to discrete regional disasters whose initial danger quickly passes; the coronavirus, however, could surface anywhere, and all at once. On the flight home from Albany, Semonite had concluded that states other than New York would soon need help, and that the pandemic could last for a year or more. The best way to address such a complicated nationwide problem was with a template simple enough that it could be quickly implemented in a variety of locations. A state needed to be able to pivot, based on how many patients it had and how sick they were. Huntsville Center engineers began thinking about transforming not only hotels and convention centers but also gymnasiums and dorms. During the pandemic of 1918, the Army had converted barracks into hospitals; photographs show sickbeds in packed rows, a dispiriting image that New York officials wanted to avoid. To maintain “battle rhythm” as the planning progressed, Semonite held twice-daily teleconferences, sometimes involving hundreds of people. He demanded “the good-enough solution,” warning engineers, “Don’t make a science project out of it.”
Semonite is known for his ability to succinctly convey complex material using picture-book phrasings like “a lotta, lotta rain” and “super-big sandbags.” In practice, engineers use precise parameters in their work. Amanda Pommerenck, a Corps civil engineer who is a division chief in Huntsville, said that, if someone asks her the size of a window, she takes out a tape measure. Quickly subdividing a wide-open space into individual units suitable for potentially complex patient care and infection control was the kind of challenge that made engineers “see double.” It is “not normal for an organization like ours to churn out” a project based on such an abstract directive, she told me. Yet engineers are also creative. Pommerenck and her husband, also an engineer, “MacGyver a lot of stuff,” she said, adding, “If we don’t have the right tool, we make the right tool.”


newyorker--2020-07-27--“Heirlooms,” by Bryan Washington

“Heirlooms,” by Bryan Washington

He ’ s not doing well , Mike says .
And instead of Mike ’ s usual You Didn ’ t Do It , or his You Don ’ t Have to Say That , he just says , Thank you .
Just lovely , I say .
Still adjusting to our shared proximity .
That ’ s what she told me .
But it ’ s a compliment , Mike says .
Could be worse .
Ma says you ’ ve been cooking .
We play house together , yes .
Just because the neighborhood ’ s snoring , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s asleep .
There ’ s a house party going on a few doors down .
Some white girls trample onto the lawn , laughing , with red Solo cups .
They glance back at the door , and one of them covers her mouth , and her friend latches on to her shoulders .
Hey , I say , when are you coming home ?
Scattered voices slip through the phone , and also the sound of motion .
For Mike , it ’ s midday .
That ’ s the question @ @ @ @ @ @ @ says .
Mike asks if I want him to come back , and I don ’ t say a word .
We ’ re both silent .
Both holding the line .
Not everything , he says .
But I think I should see him through this , you know ?
So when he ’ s gone , Mike says , I ’ ll come back .
When he ’ s gone , I say , you ’ ll come back .
The white girls stumble into the grass , laughing all over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ flickering .
A chill settles in .
And our neighbor , as if snapping out of a reverie , smiles and waves my way , putting her whole shoulder into it .
And you , Mike says .
How are you doing ?
The other day I saw a pigeon fly away with some cash , I say .
Go figure .
It ’ s probably for booze .
You think so ?
I shut the door behind me as quietly as I can , but Mitsuko ’ s already asleep on the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of rice on the counter , covered with a paper towel .
It ’ s still a little warm .
And another week after that .
And then , nearly two months in , it ’ s astounding how little Mitsuko and I have talked about her son .
When I tell her this , she shakes her head .
What is there to discuss ?
she says .
What could you possibly tell me ?
I asked you once already and you gave me nothing .
He came out of my body @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a homosexual .
He left his mother with a stranger .
I ’ ve already got everything I need to know .
She ’ s sitting at the table , scrolling through her tablet .
I ’ m in the kitchen , leaning over the stove .
Exactly , Mitsuko says .
You don ’ t .
So don ’ t worry about it .
Maybe you could tell me a story , I say , and Mitsuko actually laughs .
A story is an heirloom , she says .
It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t ask for heirlooms .
They ’ re just given to you .
I figure she ’ s just cutting me off , but then I look at the stove and it ’ s bubbling .
One afternoon , I watch Mitsuko crack an egg in her palm .
I think it ’ s a fluke , but then she does it again .
How did you do that ?
Mitsuko gives me this look like she ’ s entirely exasperated .
But then she does it again , executing the cleanest of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ text Mike , thinking he ’ ll just be starting his day , after Mitsuko and I finish an elaborate collaboration : udon cooked in a hot pot , beside abura-age and kamaboko and spinach and two chicken legs .
When Mitsuko cracks an egg into the pot and tastes a spoonful , she actually doesn ’ t grimace .
Once we ’ ve brought everything below a simmer , I take some photos .
All of them are blurry .
But when I send them to Mike he responds immediately .
Mike @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an exclamation point in our correspondence .
Ever .
He ’ s not one of those people .
I ask if he ’ s all right .
The next message he sends takes a little longer to arrive .
No , he says .
And I stare at the phone .
I don ’ t need to be told that there ’ s nothing I can say to make it better .
Mike went to find his dying father , and now his father is dying .
Thank you , Mike says .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ writes : For not apologizing .
And then , immediately : I ’ ll call soon .
Everything will be OK , he says .
I promise , he says , and that ’ s what I take to sleep with me .
Mike ’ s never promised me anything .
Only delivered or didn ’ t .
He always said that promises were only words , and words meant only what you made them mean .
I slip on basketball shorts , some sandals , and dip into the living room .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ and her pair of graying sneakers .
She gives me a look when I cough in the hallway .
You can come , she says , but keep your mouth shut .
We walk to the next street over , and then a few blocks more .
The air is mild for Houston .
A little too crisp for February .
Plodding behind Mitsuko on the sidewalk , I wonder what we look like to anyone watching from a window .
Eventually , we stop in front of a church .
Something Something @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and then at the signage , and she waves me over to the door .
There ’ s a light on by the pulpit , but otherwise the place is empty .
The aisles are cleared .
The seats are clean .
The church ’ s windows are stained with various highlights from the Old Testament .
When we reach the pulpit , Mitsuko takes to her knees .
I feel ridiculous standing behind her , so I settle next to her .
We stay like that for a while .
Mitsuko mutters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Her hands are clasped .
Her head is bowed .
At one point , I hear Mike ’ s name , and then once again , but that ’ s all I get .
It ’ s been at least a decade since I stepped into a church .
I ’ d been baptized , as a teen , because my mother had insisted .
The pastor dunked me in the water and everything .
Afterward , I came out soaking , feeling brand new , like money , and I ate a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ went back again .
I wonder how long Mitsuko ’ s been doing this .
I wonder if it ’ s even legal .
If we ’ re trespassing somehow .
But when Mitsuko ’ s finished she nods toward the choir pews , at no one at all .
Then she stands up beside me , steadying herself on my shoulder .
Hurry up , she says .
We ’ re leaving .
Back in the apartment , I pour us both a glass of water .
Mitsuko doesn ’ t thank @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In case you ’ re wondering , she says , that ’ s what it ’ s come to .
It ’ s absurd .
We do what we can , I say .
With that , Mitsuko looks me in the eyes .
It feels like only the second time she ’ s done that since I ’ ve known her .
And then briefly , nearly imperceptibly , she gives me a nod .
But the moment doesn ’ t last .
I watch her drink the water .
That ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So I take my glass back to the bedroom , draining the rest on the way .
♦

Audio available Listen to this story Audio: Bryan Washington reads.
It’s still dark when I wake up, the morning after Mike leaves, but Mitsuko’s mincing shrimp. She’s hunched over the cutting board, beside eggs, flour, and honey.
Do you eat, she asks.
I tell her I do.
We don’t say shit while she’s working. Mitsuko blitzes everything in a food processor. Drops the mixture in a skillet, dabbing everything with soy sauce, folding the batter gradually. I take my meds, watching her do all this, and she ignores me the entire time, working at her own pace.
When I sit on the sofa, Mitsuko stops rolling. I stand to set the table, and she starts rolling again.
Once she’s finished, she fills a bowl with some pickled cucumbers and puts an omelette on a plate, leaving another one out for me. We eat hunched over the counter, hip to hip.
So, Mitsuko says, how long have you been sleeping with my son? Or is it casual?
Not really, I say.
I don’t know how it works, Mitsuko says.
I think it’s the same for everyone.
It isn’t, Mitsuko says.
She says, I’m sure you can tell that Michael and I are very close.
We’ve been together for four years, I say. More or less.
More, Mitsuko asks, or less?
A little more, I say.
But just a little, she says.
Mike’s better with numbers, I say.
It occurs to me that my posture is entirely fucked up. Mitsuko’s is impeccable, even at a lean. So I straighten up, and then I stoop, and Mitsuko raises an eyebrow.
She snorts, and says, My son could not be worse with numbers.
After that, we eat in silence. Scattered Spanish filters in through the window. The kids next door kick a soccer ball against the wall, until their father, a big Venezuelan dude, steps outside yelling, asking which one of them has lost their fucking mind.
While Mitsuko’s focussed on her food, I really look at her. It’s clear that, at one point, she was a startlingly beautiful woman.
Then she meets my eyes. I blink like something’s in them.
She says, I realize that this must be strange for you, too.
No, I say, it’s fine.
So you’re a liar, Mitsuko says.
I’m being honest. Really.
I’m fluent in fine, Mitsuko says. Fine means fucked. Did my son tell you how long he’d be gone?
A month, I say. Maybe two. I don’t know. We didn’t talk too much about it.
Of course not.
But did he tell you?
Tell me what?
How long he’d be gone, I say. Or that he was leaving?
Mitsuko cracks her knuckles on the counter. No, she says. My son neglected to give me that information. But this could be a good thing. I needed to get out of Japan for a while. No sense in rushing back to Tokyo to look at a dying man.
So, I ask, you’re staying here? Until Mike gets back?
My voice cracks, just a bit. But Mitsuko hears it. She grins.
Would that be a problem? she asks.
No, I say. That’s not what I meant.
Then what did you mean?
I’m sorry, I say. I really was just asking.
Mitsuko crosses her arms. She leans on the counter, and her hair slips down her shoulders. I make a point to slow my breathing, to let my shoulders droop just a bit.
Then, I think staying here is exactly what I’ll do, Mitsuko says. I could use the time off. Your place is filthy, but it’ll work until Michael makes it back.
And that’s absolutely O.K., I say. Totally perfect.
Remember, Mitsuko says, you’re the one who let him leave.
You’re right, I say. I’m the one who let him leave.
How generous, Mitsuko says, but then she doesn’t say anything else.
Once she’s finished her plate, she drops it in the sink. She turns on the faucet. Reaches for mine. The omelette was delicious, the sort of thing Mike would cook, because he has always done everything in the kitchen, and I think that this may have been the problem to begin with.
Nice chat, Mitsuko says, and I apologize, but I’m not sure why.
•
Here is the root of the problem, our problem: in bed, before we fucked, the night before Mike flew to Osaka, to visit his father—a man who’d left the States when his son was a teen; a man whose voice Mike hadn’t heard in more than a decade; a man who was fighting cancer, with no hope of recovery, only for his son to volunteer to nurse him into his deathbed—he asked if I thought we were working.
What the fuck kind of question is that? I asked. Working. Are you saying we’re done? Right after we bring home your fucking mother from the fucking airport? To visit you?


newyorker--2020-07-27--“Limbo,” by Maxine Scates

“Limbo,” by Maxine Scates

I still wore the cut-offs I ’ d hurried into her room wearing that morning , and , as we inched toward an off-ramp in the valley after going to the mortuary and the cemetery to make arrangements for the mass , the music and the lowering , something shimmered , hovered the way it had all day , the way a month or so ago when I ’ d walked into her room and awakened her , she told me her daughter had died , and I said , No , I ’ m still here .
But she @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and longer to come back from where she had begun to dwell , minutes later asking when were they coming for the body ?
My body , though she did not seem to know who I was , until finally , fully awake , she mused , I think I ’ m the one who is supposed to die .
But I think she was right , part of me did die with her .
She took the stories she still told me , what she ’ d told herself her whole life @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that held them here .
They surface now , break up , winged bits of light , like the floaters in my eye one evening when every time I tried to focus they sped away .

Audio: A version read by the author.
I still wore the cut-offs I’d hurried into her room
wearing that morning, and, as we inched
toward an off-ramp in the valley
after going to the mortuary and the cemetery
to make arrangements for the mass, the music
and the lowering, something shimmered,
hovered the way it had all day, the way
a month or so ago when I’d walked into her room
and awakened her, she told me
her daughter had died,
and I said, No, I’m still here. But she insisted
because it was taking her longer and longer
to come back from where she had begun to dwell,
minutes later asking when
were they coming for the body? My body,
though she did not seem to know who I was,
until finally, fully awake, she mused, I think
I’m the one who is supposed to die. But
I think she was right,
part of me did die with her. She took the stories
she still told me, what she’d told herself
her whole life to get by. She was all
that held them here. They surface now,
break up, winged bits of light,
like the floaters in my eye one evening
when every time I tried to focus they sped away.