newrepublic--2020-12-02--Transcript: Questioning U.S. Military Primacy

Georgia Senator Kelly Loeffler comes from a family of Midwestern farmers .
She studied at the University of Illinois , got an MBA at DePaul University in Chicago , and worked in the private sector until 2019 , when the governor of Georgia , Brian Kemp , appointed her to fill a Senate seat vacated by Johnny Isakson , who left for health reasons .
This year , as a Senator , she conveniently offloaded some stocks just in time to escape the worst losses of the pandemic .
Now she ’ s competing with Democrat Raphael Warnock in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ races up for grabs in Georgia .
The contest is incredibly consequential .
If Loeffler wins , Republicans will retain control of the Senate , and make life very , very hard for Joe Biden .
We ’ re joined now by Alex Shepherd , a staff writer at The New Republic , to talk about who Kelly Loeffler is , and why the insider trading fiasco hasn ’ t heard her more .
Alex , just to start off , how exactly did a farm girl from Illinois end up a Senator @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think if you listen to the way that Kelly Loeffler tells it , she is somebody who grew up on a hardscrabble soybean farm , and clawed her way to the top by sheer force of will and pluck .
I think the real story is that she got there the way a lot of U.S .
Senators have gotten there : She worked in the financial sector for a long period of time , amassing a small fortune , and then—I guess this is a little different than some other senators—she married @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the New York Stock Exchange .
At that point , her fortune ballooned .
She became the establishment Republican choice when a Georgia Senate seat opened up in late 2019 .
And she ’ s sort of clawed onto that seat ever since , fending off a Trumpist challenger whom I think the president still secretly wants , Doug Collins .
But also she ’ s done it by tacking to the right and casting herself as one of Trump ’ s most important allies in the Senate .
But in general , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ person you look at and say , “ This is a savvy campaigner , this is somebody who has a lot of experience in Georgia politics.
” She hasn ’ t even lived in the state for very long .
And I think that ’ s where some of the stuff about growing up on a farm comes from .
Alex Pareene : You ’ re right , she leans on the farming background a lot for , I think , rural authenticity purposes .
But Midwestern soybean farms are not little mom-and-pop @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , in addition to her father running a trucking business , they received literally millions of dollars in federal subsidies for their crops .
Alex Shepard : I mean , I was trying to dig into the specifics about her family ’ s financial situations , but I think if you just look at the disclosures that we do have from farm subsidies , the suggestion is that this is not a character out of Let Us Now Praise Famous Men , this is somebody who ’ s largely lived a pretty charmed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the point that she owns a professional sports franchise .
Laura : You ’ ve written about her for this issue ’ s “ Oligarch of the Month ” column .
How rich is Kelly Loeffler ?
Alex Shepherd : So this is one of the great mysteries .
It ’ s difficult to tell even with financial disclosures , in part because so much of the wealth is tied up in stock .
You can ’ t say that she is the richest member of Congress , so everyone comes up with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ She ’ s likely the richest member of Congress ” ?
But the general estimates are somewhere in the $ 500 million mark .
The high estimate is about $ 800 million .
Laura : The photo that ran with your article in the magazine is her and her husband Jim Sprecher standing in front of their mansion in Georgia .
You can see the front door , there are two big columns , lots of marble—it ’ s a real mansion , it ’ s not just a big house .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ most expensive real estate transaction in Atlanta history .
Alex Shepherd : My favorite thing about this house is that it has a name , and that name is Descante .
Alex Shepherd : According to this real estate article that I read , it ’ s a 15th century Italian word , and it means the highest harmony to the main melody of life .
Laura : Oh , how musical .
Because once you get rich , then you have to prove that you are cultured .
Alex Pareene : It @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you have to play as a wealthy person who has decided to enter electoral politics and what you have to do if you ’ re just being a normal wealthy person .
Like on the one hand , when you ’ re trying to buy your way into high society , you ’ re like , “ My house needs a name.
” And then when you ’ re running in a runoff election , you ’ re like , “ No one look at my house with a name.
” Alex Shepherd @ @ @ @ @ @ @ these places , nothing about them makes any sense .
One article referred to its “ Versailles parquet.
” And I was like , it sounds nice .
I have no idea what it is .
Alex Pareene : We were looking into that for my kid ’ s bedroom—Versailles parquet .
Laura : Well , I guess all this discussion of her wealth leads into the main question I have about why Kelly Loeffler is even able to come in second in this last Senate race , and how she ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is that the main thing that she ’ s known for is her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic .
What happened there ?
Alex Shepherd : She sold $ 20 million in stocks after receiving a briefing about just how bad Covid-19 was at a time when most Americans weren ’ t thinking about it at all .
Shortly after Kelly Loeffler joins the United States Senate , in January of this year , she is part of a closed door briefing of United States senators .
The senators are told that this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s going to result in a significant disruption of the United States economy .
On the same day , Loeffler starts to unload stocks , and over the next few weeks , liquidates close to $ 20 million in stock holdings .
Once Covid hits , those stocks lose a third of their value .
She also buys two stocks , one of which is a company that makes telework software .
So these are very prescient stock trades .
While these investment decisions are being made , Loeffler is publicly backing the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is just like the flu , it ’ s going to go away.
” Eventually , she is among four U.S .
Senators whose trades are investigated by the Department of Justice and I believe the Senate Ethics Committee as well—Richard Burr , Jim Inhofe , Dianne Feinstein , and Kelly Loeffler .
Laura : Obviously that happened quite a long time ago .
Have there been any consequences for her ?
Alex Shepherd : So Loeffler ’ s position is that she didn ’ t know about it , and that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with this briefing from Dr. Fauci and others .
Given her portfolio—and given that her husband is also the CEO of a company that is in charge of the New York Stock Exchange—it ’ s sensible that there would be third-party advisors making these decisions .
And yet I think even that explanation overlooks the bigger problem here , which is that Loeffler was knowingly downplaying the risks of what was coming .
And while she was doing that , whether she knew about it or not , she was making sure that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ order .
Laura : In terms of there being an inquiry , that ’ s all over now ?
Alex Shepherd : So the Department of Justice closed its inquiry in May , and Senate Ethics , I think , did around the same time .
And I think because of the involvement of a third party , this case was probably not going to be prosecutable , although that says more about United States ’ enforcement of insider trading laws in general .
When you look into the actual circumstances here , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : I can talk about congressional insider trading all day .
It was fully legal until 2012 .
Alex Pareene : Yeah !
It it was legal for members of Congress to insider trade until 2012 .
And then a round of insider trading scandals led them to pass the Stock Act , which finally made it illegal to insider trade for members of Congress .
Originally the bill said that every stock trade they made and all their financial disclosures had to be available in an online database .
And right after @ @ @ @ @ @ @ new law that changed it , so that to get the records , you ’ d have to go to the basement of an actual Capitol building and print them out for , like , 15 cents a page .
So it ’ s pretty difficult to get in trouble for insider trading in Congress .
Laura : The thing I ’ m still trying to wrap my head around is , Okay , the investigation has been dropped .
To be at the center of that story , though—surely that still has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And 1.2 million voters in Georgia decided that Kelly Loeffler is the person that they want as their Senator .
She got 25 percent of the vote .
How does that happen ?
Alex Shepherd : I think that there are a couple things happening here .
One is that these races are playing out in culture-war terms , and Loeffler has responded to these allegations as if these are political charges being made against her because people don ’ t like the president and they don ’ t like how much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the other thing is that Loeffler is running a campaign that is in large part opposed to Covid-19 restrictions , in a state whose governor , Brian Kemp , has been on the front lines of fighting against any sort of mask mandate or other restriction , to the point that they ’ re doing a campaign events that are largely unmasked .
Florida Senator Rick Scott recently appeared without a mask at one and then tested positive .
Laura : So looking ahead to the runoff , if someone were to look @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 32 percent , Loeffler got 25 , and her Republican rival , Doug Collins , got 20 .
Just looking at the math there , it seems like if you add up the two Republicans , you get a winner against the Democrat .
What ’ s the likely outcome , in your opinion , of that runoff election in January ?
Alex Shepherd : The way that Georgia runoffs work , they ’ ve always favored Republicans in the past .
I think the Republicans are doing everything they possibly can on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ referendum on the “ stolen ” election that happened on November 3 .
I do think that Georgia is a mystery all of a sudden , but Loeffler is clearly the favorite in this race and should probably be expected to win .
Alex Pareene : Well , that ’ ll give us plenty of time for various financial scandals to point at and ask why voters don ’ t care about them .

Alex Shepherd: So this is one of the great mysteries. It’s difficult to tell even with financial disclosures, in part because so much of the wealth is tied up in stock. You can’t say that she is the richest member of Congress, so everyone comes up with a funny way to say it: “She’s likely the richest member of Congress”? But the general estimates are somewhere in the $500 million mark. The high estimate is about $800 million.
Laura: The photo that ran with your article in the magazine is her and her husband Jim Sprecher standing in front of their mansion in Georgia. You can see the front door, there are two big columns, lots of marble—it’s a real mansion, it’s not just a big house. That, I believe, was the most expensive real estate transaction in Atlanta history.
Alex Shepherd: My favorite thing about this house is that it has a name, and that name is Descante.
Laura: Pardon?
Alex Shepherd: According to this real estate article that I read, it’s a 15th century Italian word, and it means the highest harmony to the main melody of life.
Laura: Oh, how musical. Because once you get rich, then you have to prove that you are cultured.
Alex Pareene: It’s very funny the authenticity games you have to play as a wealthy person who has decided to enter electoral politics and what you have to do if you’re just being a normal wealthy person. Like on the one hand, when you’re trying to buy your way into high society, you’re like, “My house needs a name.” And then when you’re running in a runoff election, you’re like, “No one look at my house with a name.”
Alex Shepherd: When you start to read about these places, nothing about them makes any sense. One article referred to its “Versailles parquet.” And I was like, it sounds nice. I have no idea what it is.
Alex Pareene: We were looking into that for my kid’s bedroom—Versailles parquet.
Laura: Well, I guess all this discussion of her wealth leads into the main question I have about why Kelly Loeffler is even able to come in second in this last Senate race, and how she’s made it to a runoff, which is that the main thing that she’s known for is her handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. What happened there?
Alex Shepherd: She sold $20 million in stocks after receiving a briefing about just how bad Covid-19 was at a time when most Americans weren’t thinking about it at all. Shortly after Kelly Loeffler joins the United States Senate, in January of this year, she is part of a closed door briefing of United States senators. The senators are told that this virus is very deadly, it’s going to result in a significant disruption of the United States economy. On the same day, Loeffler starts to unload stocks, and over the next few weeks, liquidates close to $20 million in stock holdings. Once Covid hits, those stocks lose a third of their value. She also buys two stocks, one of which is a company that makes telework software. So these are very prescient stock trades. While these investment decisions are being made, Loeffler is publicly backing the Trump administration’s line—“This is just like the flu, it’s going to go away.” Eventually, she is among four U.S. Senators whose trades are investigated by the Department of Justice and I believe the Senate Ethics Committee as well—Richard Burr, Jim Inhofe, Dianne Feinstein, and Kelly Loeffler.
Laura: Obviously that happened quite a long time ago. Have there been any consequences for her?
Alex Shepherd: So Loeffler’s position is that she didn’t know about it, and that the timing of this just happened to coincide with this briefing from Dr. Fauci and others. Given her portfolio—and given that her husband is also the CEO of a company that is in charge of the New York Stock Exchange—it’s sensible that there would be third-party advisors making these decisions. And yet I think even that explanation overlooks the bigger problem here, which is that Loeffler was knowingly downplaying the risks of what was coming. And while she was doing that, whether she knew about it or not, she was making sure that her own house was very much in order.
Laura: In terms of there being an inquiry, that’s all over now?
Alex Shepherd: So the Department of Justice closed its inquiry in May, and Senate Ethics, I think, did around the same time. And I think because of the involvement of a third party, this case was probably not going to be prosecutable, although that says more about United States’ enforcement of insider trading laws in general. When you look into the actual circumstances here, it remains extraordinarily shady.
Alex Pareene: I can talk about congressional insider trading all day. It was fully legal until 2012.
Laura: Wait, what?
Alex Pareene: Yeah! It it was legal for members of Congress to insider trade until 2012. And then a round of insider trading scandals led them to pass the Stock Act, which finally made it illegal to insider trade for members of Congress. Originally the bill said that every stock trade they made and all their financial disclosures had to be available in an online database. And right after they passed it, they passed a new law that changed it, so that to get the records, you’d have to go to the basement of an actual Capitol building and print them out for, like, 15 cents a page. So it’s pretty difficult to get in trouble for insider trading in Congress.
Alex Shepherd: Yeah.
Laura: The thing I’m still trying to wrap my head around is, Okay, the investigation has been dropped. To be at the center of that story, though—surely that still has to be in the minds of voters. And 1.2 million voters in Georgia decided that Kelly Loeffler is the person that they want as their Senator. She got 25 percent of the vote. How does that happen?
Alex Shepherd: I think that there are a couple things happening here. One is that these races are playing out in culture-war terms, and Loeffler has responded to these allegations as if these are political charges being made against her because people don’t like the president and they don’t like how much she likes the president. I think the other thing is that Loeffler is running a campaign that is in large part opposed to Covid-19 restrictions, in a state whose governor, Brian Kemp, has been on the front lines of fighting against any sort of mask mandate or other restriction, to the point that they’re doing a campaign events that are largely unmasked. Florida Senator Rick Scott recently appeared without a mask at one and then tested positive.
Laura: So looking ahead to the runoff, if someone were to look at the last round, Warnock got 32 percent, Loeffler got 25, and her Republican rival, Doug Collins, got 20. Just looking at the math there, it seems like if you add up the two Republicans, you get a winner against the Democrat. What’s the likely outcome, in your opinion, of that runoff election in January?
Alex Shepherd: The way that Georgia runoffs work, they’ve always favored Republicans in the past. I think the Republicans are doing everything they possibly can on a national level to make this a referendum on the “stolen” election that happened on November 3. I do think that Georgia is a mystery all of a sudden, but Loeffler is clearly the favorite in this race and should probably be expected to win.
Alex Pareene: Well, that’ll give us plenty of time for various financial scandals to point at and ask why voters don’t care about them.


newrepublic--2020-12-02--The Most Unpardonable Presidential Power

Trump ’ s predecessors have not always used this power wisely .
Even if you accept that Gerald Ford ’ s “ full , free , and unconditional ” pardon of Richard Nixon was granted in good faith , it arguably nourished a sense of elite impunity that ’ s still keenly felt on both sides of the aisle in Washington today .
Subsequent presidents only contributed to the seaminess of the privilege .
On Christmas Eve in 1992 , lame-duck president George H.W .
Bush pardoned former Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger and other indicted conspirators in the Iran-Contra @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Bill Clinton doled out pardons to Democratic financiers , political allies , and even his own brother in the final moments of his presidency .
George W. Bush commuted a White House aide ’ s conviction on charges that emerged from the Valerie Plame scandal .
And even for pardons and commutations without the swamp-like undertones , the well-heeled and well-connected seem to receive them at a disproportionate level than less affluent convicts with more convincing claims of being wronged by the judicial system .
Under Trump , all of these trends @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his pardons went to deserving recipients like Alice Johnson and Pat Nolan , who have become outspoken advocates of criminal-justice reform .
But all too often they went to those who served Trump ’ s personal or political ends .
He used acts of clemency to shield accused and convicted war criminals in the U.S. military from consequences .
He rewarded political supporters like Joe Arpaio and Dinesh D ’ Souza by wiping away their charges and convictions .
And he doled out clemency to figures like Rod Blagojevich , Scooter Libby , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the Justice Department and those who led it .
Newspaper mogul-turned-fraudster Conrad Black—f.k.a .
the Right Honourable Lord Black of Crossharbour—was pardoned by Trump in 2019 as a transparent reward for authoring a library ’ s worth of fulsome praise for the president across a multitude of formats .
Perhaps his most serious ethical breaches came when it came to the Russia investigation .
Earlier this year , in the wake of the Senate acquittal vote in his impeachment trial , Trump commuted a prison sentence that longtime ally Roger Stone had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump campaign ’ s Russian contacts in 2016 .
It was an astoundingly corrupt act even by Trump ’ s standards—rewarding an apparent co-conspirator in the investigation for taking criminal actions from which the president himself had benefited .
Even then , Trump had foreshadowed his self-serving move : He and Giuliani all but promised a pardon for former campaign chairman Paul Manafort in 2018 if he didn ’ t cooperate with Mueller .

Trump’s predecessors have not always used this power wisely. Even if you accept that Gerald Ford’s “full, free, and unconditional” pardon of Richard Nixon was granted in good faith, it arguably nourished a sense of elite impunity that’s still keenly felt on both sides of the aisle in Washington today. Subsequent presidents only contributed to the seaminess of the privilege. On Christmas Eve in 1992, lame-duck President George H.W. Bush pardoned former Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger and other indicted conspirators in the Iran-Contra scandal before they could go to trial. Bill Clinton doled out pardons to Democratic financiers, political allies, and even his own brother in the final moments of his presidency. George W. Bush commuted a White House aide’s conviction on charges that emerged from the Valerie Plame scandal. And even for pardons and commutations without the swamplike undertones, the well-heeled and well-connected seem to receive them at a disproportionate level compared to less affluent convicts with more convincing claims of being wronged by the judicial system.
Under Trump, all of these trends reached their natural conclusion. Some of his pardons went to deserving recipients like Alice Johnson and Pat Nolan, who have become outspoken advocates of criminal justice reform. But all too often they went to those who served Trump’s personal or political ends. He used acts of clemency to shield accused and convicted war criminals in the U.S. military from consequences. He rewarded political supporters like Joe Arpaio and Dinesh D’Souza by wiping away their charges and convictions. And he doled out clemency to figures like Rod Blagojevich, Scooter Libby, and Bernard Kerik in an implicit critique of the Justice Department and those who led it. Newspaper-mogul-turned-fraudster Conrad Black—f.k.a. the Right Honourable Lord Black of Crossharbour—was pardoned by Trump in 2019 as a transparent reward for authoring a library’s worth of fulsome praise for the president across a multitude of formats.
Perhaps his most serious ethical breaches occurred when it came to the Russia investigation. Earlier this year, in the wake of the Senate acquittal vote in his impeachment trial, Trump commuted a prison sentence that longtime ally Roger Stone had received for lying to Congress about the Trump campaign’s Russian contacts in 2016. It was an astoundingly corrupt act, even by Trump’s standards—rewarding an apparent co-conspirator in the investigation for taking criminal actions from which the president himself had benefited. Even then, Trump had foreshadowed his self-serving move: He and Giuliani all but promised a pardon for former campaign chairman Paul Manafort in 2018 if he didn’t cooperate with Mueller.


newrepublic--2020-12-02--Wong Kar-wai’s Masterpieces of Political Uncertainty

Meanwhile , the texture of everyday life in Hong Kong is lovingly conveyed : You know far more about the detail of the diner staff ’ s work routines than you do about their personalities or histories , and you understand their inner lives mainly because these seep so extravagantly into the physical environment ( and vice versa ) .
The policemen themselves are exceptions : You never see them work , and they are not , in any case , presented as the kind of people you can imagine arresting anyone ; they operate more like flaneurs frolicking through @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the movie ’ s setting as a kind of dreamscape , a Hong Kong of the mind , one that ’ s jarring to revisit in 2020 , when fears about the future have left the realm of abstraction , and no one could pull off casting a cop as his everyman .
Wong ’ s tone darkened in Happy Together ( 1997 ) , which is set just before the handover but sends its male lovers to Argentina .
The question of belonging is vexed throughout .
The opening shots show the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ British National ( Overseas ) , ” and then one suggests to the other , “ Let ’ s start over ” ; later we ’ ll see the narrator try to cling on to the doomed affair by confiscating his lover ’ s passport .
As well as focusing on a love feared to be more under threat post-1997 , the film was released with the subtitle “ A Story About Reunion , ” giving its exploration of a long uneasy partnership a more openly political valence .
Yet Wong remained @ @ @ @ @ @ @ realities but in the pressures they subtly exert on the inner life .
Even at his most maximalist , Wong has a fondness for the unsaid—a phone rings in an empty booth , an important letter goes unopened , a secret is whispered into a hole or recorded on a tape and later found to be unintelligible .
In the Mood for love marked a shift .
Whereas Wong ’ s earlier films were freewheeling , the theme of this movie is restraint .
Two strangers , Mrs. Chan ( Maggie Cheung ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , rent rooms in adjacent apartments with their spouses , who are often absent .
After working out that the spouses are having an affair , they begin spending more time together , trying to understand what has happened and keeping each other company .
They grow closer , attracting gossipy disapproval from their landladies , and even meet in a hotel room ( numbered “ 2046 ” ) to work on writing a story together .
Nothing is consummated and little is said .
Yet much is expressed in the film ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s Latin American love songs and signature waltz , and the corresponding quick-quick-slow choreography of camerawork and small gestures that repeat with variations as time passes .
Characters are glimpsed in mirrors , behind curtains and doors or down hallways , passing each other in stairwells .
A hand tenses against a table during a phone call .
The back of Mrs. Chan ’ s head obscures the face of the landlady warning that she ’ s going out too often for a married woman , so that the viewer is left to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hand picking at her bracelet .
There ’ s the sense of a social world that ’ s all precise ritual and no privacy , with unexpressed emotion coursing underneath .
The restraint between the lovers is accentuated by an accompanying theatricality .
One night , stuck sheltering from the rain together , they agree to rehearse a parting scene .
The camera follows her hand , first clasped in his , then letting go and moving to clutch her other arm , so that we sweep upward with it to a close-up @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , with his figure retreating down the street behind her .
The screen is briefly black as we hear her sobbing , and he reminds her , “ It isn ’ t real , ” though it soon will be .

That blend of claustrophobia and precariousness is key to Wong’s work: The historical uncertainties of late-twentieth-century Hong Kong, though often only obliquely hinted at within his films, shape the texture of all his characters’ private lives. His most upbeat, playful treatment of the theme is Chungking Express (1994), which gave him his international breakthrough. It still has an exuberance that feels more or less untethered from its actual content, as if the audience is being invited to join in the director’s enjoyment of his own freedom to experiment. The film consists of the separate romantic misadventures of two cops we know by their ID numbers. Their stories are not interwoven, but presented consecutively, linked only by the fact that they both frequent the same fast-food joint. Characters you attach to in the first half never reappear. The love affair in the second half is conducted in a glancing, indirect fashion—one lover secretly visits the other’s empty apartment, rearranging and replacing small items in it. That sense of whimsy, contingency, and fragile connection suffuses the film: One character collects tins of pineapple with a May 1 expiry date, and muses on how love or, by implication, any given way of living must have its expiration. Such adorably stoned voice-overs also double as sly references to the impending handover to China.
Meanwhile, the texture of everyday life in Hong Kong is lovingly conveyed: You know far more about the detail of the diner staff’s work routines than you do about their personalities or histories, and you understand their inner lives mainly because these seep so extravagantly into the physical environment (and vice versa). The policemen themselves are exceptions: You never see them work, and they are not, in any case, presented as the kind of people you can imagine arresting anyone; they operate more like flaneurs frolicking through the city. That above all marks the movie’s setting as a kind of dreamscape, a Hong Kong of the mind, one that’s jarring to revisit in 2020, when fears about the future have left the realm of abstraction, and no one could pull off casting a cop as his everyman.
Wong’s tone darkened in Happy Together (1997), which is set just before the handover but sends its male lovers to Argentina. The question of belonging is vexed throughout. The opening shots show the protagonists’ passports, which designate them “British National (Overseas),” and then one suggests to the other, “Let’s start over”; later we’ll see the narrator try to cling on to the doomed affair by confiscating his lover’s passport. As well as focusing on a love feared to be more under threat post-1997, the film was released with the subtitle “A Story About Reunion,” giving its exploration of a long uneasy partnership a more openly political valence. Yet Wong remained constitutionally anti-polemical—his interest is not in political realities but in the pressures they subtly exert on the inner life. Even at his most maximalist, Wong has a fondness for the unsaid—a phone rings in an empty booth, an important letter goes unopened, a secret is whispered into a hole or recorded on a tape and later found to be unintelligible.


newrepublic--2020-12-02--Does America Really Need More Inside-the-Beltway Journalism?

While newsletters have long been on the rise in the media landscape , 2020 has become the year they finally reached “ so hot right now ” status .
Perhaps not coincidentally , 2020 has also been a year of atomization , consolidation , and contraction for the media industry .
Large outlets , particularly The New York Times , have spent the year plucking media stars from smaller , typically digital , outlets .
Many of the luminaries that haven ’ t felt the gravitational pull of the most prestigious media organizations have broken free , starting paid newsletters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the moment .
With media organizations shedding thousands of jobs in the age of Covid-19 and the Google/Facebook ad duopoly , independence and self-sufficiency , once enormously risky , suddenly look almost as stable as a staff job—provided , of course , you have the audience and name recognition to make the leap .
Tuesday brought news of the latest media uncoupling .
Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer , the writers of Politico Playbook , the infamous Beltway tipsheet that ’ s tracked who ’ s up and who ’ s down in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be teaming up with longtime editor John Bresnahan to launch a competing newsletter starting next year .
The resulting product “ will include a heavy focus on Capitol Hill reporting , given the expertise of the trio , but it ’ s not designed to be a carbon copy of Politico ’ s flagship newsletter Playbook , ” Axios reported .
You ’ d be strained to discern the distinctions , based on what ’ s been reported about this “ not a carbon copy , ” however .
According to Axios ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will include other offerings aside from the newsletter.
” It ’ s not clear what those offerings will be .
Even with the details still fuzzy , this forthcoming , as yet unnamed offering , will serve as a test for an increasingly atomized media and for the post-Trump press corps , which will be tempted to return to business as usual .

There will still be a huge market for this type of enterprise in the Biden era. There may be, in fact, better days ahead for this sort of journalism, as the misrule and shame that Trump brought to This Town was often quite hard for Beltway scribblers to revise into a shape that they might respect. More important, of course, is that this sort of content will continue to attract advertisers who look to well-sourced Washington reporters to deliver an in-the-know audience with money and influence to burn.
But—and this may be too optimistic—we may be nearing a saturation point in this field of journalistic endeavor. Any new outlet, however well sourced, will have to compete with giants in the field. This is a competition that Politico already won; having outpaced staid predecessors such as The Hill and Roll Call with the high-metabolism, micro-scoop approach it more or less invented, it’s moved on to influencing the coverage of major papers such as The Washington Post. Politico will simply insert two new lifeforms into the Playbook slots vacated by Palmer and Sherman, the same way it replaced its founder, Allen. All of these successions have gone off without a hitch, and there’s likely no concern among Politico’s top brass that the next one won’t be just as seamless. The pressure will be on Playbook’s self-deportees to demonstrate their continued ability to land the scoops and score the sources that they did while working under a larger institution.
But this is a problem for a handful of elite Beltway journalists to resolve. The more interesting problem is how much more of this insider-driven political insight we can take. The big lessons of the past year point to the fact that important political stories are happening outside the 202 area code. The pandemic year led to a Biden win but not to the total collapse of Trumpism that many expected. The defeated incumbent actually improved his standing with some surprising constituencies; and it seemed that local canvassing efforts made a bigger difference in political outcomes than many expected. The next big political story, the runoff elections in Georgia, might be an acid test for a political media industry that’s increasingly concentrated in Washington, D.C., and New York City, and which remains too fixated on gossip-laden political content. A new kind of newsletter might challenge these hoary institutions by exploiting their blind spots and beating them to a richer set of stories. If this isn’t what Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer intend to do, what’s the point?


newrepublic--2020-12-02--The Girlboss Feminism of Joe Biden’s Cabinet

To date , the Biden-Harris administration has named 17 women to top posts , some of them firsts , many of them contingent on Senate confirmation .
Heading in the direction of gender parity in hiring has been regarded as another “ audacious ” Biden move , a turning point in the country ’ s history .
The opening note of this administration is meant to portend a feminist future , even if it is headed by a white man in his seventies .
After a primary that raised hopes that “ America would end up with a revolutionary person @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Monica Hesse wrote in The Washington Post , “ [ i ] nstead , we ’ ll end up with Joe Biden , ” but “ he still can be a revolutionary ” if his Cabinet consists of at least 50 percent women .
It ’ s not clear if the equality bar is set that low—a perfect half , nothing more—after the highs of the primary , or if it was always so slight .
If your political aspirations are mainly about getting a seat at the table , these appointments may @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in many ways symbolic gains , a point that even some of those who celebrate such symbolism can accept .
Their takeaway is that girls will see these women in these jobs and realize “ they can do that , too ” —not that they will also have the means to do it or that it will necessarily improve many other women ’ s lives .
It ’ s a regression to the kind of individualistic , girlboss feminism we have been trying to pull away from but that still has a powerful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to “ gender equality ” largely confined to who holds the power , not what they do with it .
We have yet to hear how , specifically , the first woman selected to head the Treasury Department or Defense would deliver something different than any or all of the men who preceded her .
And there is nothing new in the symbolic being elevated over the reality of the daily lives of the people these powerful appointees are meant to serve .

To date, the Biden-Harris administration has named 17 women to top posts, some of them firsts, many of them contingent on Senate confirmation. Heading in the direction of gender parity in hiring has been regarded as another “audacious” Biden move, a turning point in the country’s history. The opening note of this administration is meant to portend a feminist future, even if it is headed by a white man in his seventies. After a primary that raised hopes that “America would end up with a revolutionary person in the Oval Office,” columnist Monica Hesse wrote in The Washington Post, “[i]nstead, we’ll end up with Joe Biden,” but “he still can be a revolutionary” if his Cabinet consists of at least 50 percent women. It’s not clear if the equality bar is set that low—a perfect half, nothing more—after the highs of the primary, or if it was always so slight.
If your political aspirations are mainly about getting a seat at the table, these appointments may feel worth lauding. But they are in many ways symbolic gains, a point that even some of those who celebrate such symbolism can accept. Their takeaway is that girls will see these women in these jobs and realize “they can do that, too”—not that they will also have the means to do it or that it will necessarily improve many other women’s lives. It’s a regression to the kind of individualistic, girlboss feminism we have been trying to pull away from but that still has a powerful hold on those who posit a commitment to “gender equality” largely confined to who holds the power, not what they do with it.


newrepublic--2020-12-03--The Predictable, Preventable Mess of Reopening Schools in Indian Country

In August , as families across the country prepared for the new school year , Smithsonian magazine spoke to more than a dozen anonymous tribal citizens about remote learning , public health protocols , and the rest of the fraught exercise of learning in a pandemic .
A grandma from Oregon , who was also a former Bureau of Indian Affairs I.T .
specialist , said that she had to step in to teach her grandchildren for two months because their parents still had to work full-time .
A parent from the Kewa Pueblo in New Mexico felt uncomfortable with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at home : “ I want my children to get a proper Indigenous-focused education , versus the colonial cookie-cutter online learning that ’ s being shoved down children ’ s throats.
” An educator on the Muckleshoot Reservation in Washington State said they worried about the accessibility of their district ’ s online learning plan : “ My concerns are for our families too far out to access the internet .
I will make sure they get paper packets , but it ’ s still not the same as getting instruction.
” Little @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In April , speaking with the Daily Yonder , Hopi citizen Loris Taylor shared that her grandchildren relied on a single hotspot with connectivity issues to do their school work .
“ They only had one mobile handheld , so he did his homework and then his sister followed , ” she said .
“ That ’ s four hours right there for the parent to be in some parking lot with their kids .
Not very ideal.
” Seven months later , in late November , the Associated Press opened a lede @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Navajo Nation with the line , “ One student runs 85 feet up a hill every morning , just to get a cellphone signal so he can call in his attendance.
” Schools serving tribal populations , especially those funded by the federal government , have long been underfunded , and Native households , especially those in rural reservation communities , are still working to gain steady access to broadband .
There is no single story of the education crisis in Indian Country because of how varied Indian Country is , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Native students weathered the pandemic as well as their white counterparts .
Like recent crises concerning testing availability , the census , voting access , housing , and pandemic relief distribution , there is no way to separate the emergencies of the pandemic from the preexisting structural conditions forged by America ’ s legacy of land theft and anti-sovereignty .
So while it is worthwhile to examine why it is that Native students are being left behind in a global health crisis , and how the United States is failing in its trust @ @ @ @ @ @ @ say that anything here aside from the coronavirus feels new .

In August, as families across the country prepared for the new school year, Smithsonian magazine spoke to more than a dozen anonymous tribal citizens about remote learning, public health protocols, and the rest of the fraught exercise of learning in a pandemic. A grandma from Oregon, who was also a former Bureau of Indian Affairs I.T. specialist, said that she had to step in to teach her grandchildren for two months because their parents still had to work full-time. A parent from the Kewa Pueblo in New Mexico felt uncomfortable with the online curriculum her kids were learning at home: “I want my children to get a proper Indigenous-focused education, versus the colonial cookie-cutter online learning that’s being shoved down children’s throats.” An educator on the Muckleshoot Reservation in Washington State said they worried about the accessibility of their district’s online learning plan: “My concerns are for our families too far out to access the internet. I will make sure they get paper packets, but it’s still not the same as getting instruction.”
Little has changed in the months since. In April, speaking with the Daily Yonder, Hopi citizen Loris Taylor shared that her grandchildren relied on a single hotspot with connectivity issues to do their school work. “They only had one mobile handheld, so he did his homework and then his sister followed,” she said. “That’s four hours right there for the parent to be in some parking lot with their kids. Not very ideal.” Seven months later, in late November, the Associated Press opened a lede on a story about school uncertainty across the Navajo Nation with the line, “One student runs 85 feet up a hill every morning, just to get a cellphone signal so he can call in his attendance.”


newrepublic--2020-12-03--Welcome to the New Era of Cops Driving Teslas

After a lot of skepticism , Bertram says his officers in Bargersville were eventually won over after getting behind the wheel .
“ Cops don ’ t like change typically .
So that ’ s part of the battle ... .
You have to force their hand .
Once you force their hand they go.
” While departments have gotten questions about the cost , most have found the vehicles end up paying for themselves given savings on fuel and maintenance , some within a year .
Each of the departments I spoke with said they ’ d been inundated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Teslas into their fleets , mostly from the U.S. and Canada but also from departments abroad .
“ It ’ s really quick and it ’ s really quiet , ” Bertram told me ; a Model 3 can go from zero to 60 miles per hour in as little as three seconds .
“ We do a lot of zipping through the neighborhood trying to get to the back of the neighborhood for calls .
That it ’ s quiet has been beneficial a few times , ” he added , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pedestrians , bikers and animals won ’ t hear them coming at high speeds .
There are other things police like about Teslas , too .
Equipped with Google Maps , the 15-inch display screen in the center console “ is very handy while you ’ re looking for a suspect or you need to see your surroundings very quickly .
You can zoom in and see if there ’ s a lake or water in the backyard , ” Bertram said , noting that suspects frequently hide in water .
Going by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have their cars , Tesla appears to have dedicated staff working with police departments .
Bertram has been in regular contact with Tesla , mostly on an ad hoc basis to troubleshoot things that could be improved for police performance .
The company reached out after his department ’ s Model 3 purchase started making headlines , he told me .
“ It ’ s little stuff , ” he said .
“ The headlights on this car are wonderful headlights— they ’ re bright .
But when you get out of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but the headlights turn off after a minute .
So I emailed Tesla .
In the next update , if you turn the headlights on instead of leaving them on auto , they will stay on until they run the battery down .
”

Indiana state law doesn’t require public agencies to go through a formal bidding or procurement process for purchases under $50,000. So just like any other customer, the department put down a deposit on the Tesla website and got its car. (Tesla did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story, having unceremoniously dissolved its public relations department last month.)
From there, the Bargersville police department worked with its usual auto outfitter to make around $11,000 worth of changes to use the Tesla as a patrol car: installing lights, radar, antennae, and a partition commonly known as a “prisoner cage.” Bertram said it “wasn’t any more expensive to do the Tesla than the Charger.” So far, the department has gotten three Teslas and ordered two more that it plans to outfit for regular use by next year. Mostly, departments that have purchased Teslas are choosing to phase in electric vehicles once cars in their operating fleet have run their course.
The police department in Fremont, California, had a different set of motivations, linked to a citywide sustainability plan. “We wanted to do our part and test out an all-EV vehicle to see if it was a reasonable option for police vehicles around the country,” Police Chief Sean Washington told me. Local governments ordinarily don’t control where their electricity comes from, so upgrades to city fleets are one of the areas where municipal climate initiatives can make the most impact. Often, police cars are the biggest chunk of those. That Tesla has a flagship factory in Fremont was incidental to the department’s decision to bring a used 2014 Model S into its fleet in January 2018, Washington said. It bought a Model Y in July.


newrepublic--2020-12-03--Monetizing the Final Frontier

Monetizing the Final Frontier

History , of course , would suggest that treaties crumble when serious money comes into play .
Western settlers signed treaties with indigenous people in the Americas , then ignored them , as Lucianne Walkowicz , an astronomer at the Adler Planetarium and another cofounder of the JustSpace Alliance , noted .
“ In many cases , ” she told me , “ treaties are good until somebody discovers something that they want.
” She ’ s a fan of the Outer Space Treaty , finding it “ a very , like , hopeful , peaceful , almost Star Trek-esque @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hopes it proves stronger than it looks .
Historically , however , law tends to follow the facts on the ground rather than shape them .
When a new geography for commerce opens , whoever shows up first to exploit the resources sets the norm—and then law is written to validate the first movers .
“ ‘ First come , first serve ’ is essentially what ’ s going to happen when people start to do things on the moon , ” Peter Ward , author of The Consequential Frontier , said .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the moon starts in earnest , one key point is worth pausing over : The supply of ice on the moon is limited .
The estimated water reserves up there may be eye-popping at first glance , but they ’ re not that big .
They likely add up to “ three to five cubic kilometers of water , based on the studies that have come up , ” said James Schwartz , a philosopher who also studies the ethics of space exploration .
“ Not a lot of water compared to even @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It wouldn ’ t be that hard for a concerted explosion of commercial activity to chew through it all .
That may sound far-fetched , but , as all these space ethicists note , to the eyes of nineteenth-century explorers and industrialists , our planet seemed limitless , too—and it only took another century-plus of rapid commercial activity to tear through a diminishing store of finite resources .
The environmental implications of exhausting the moon seem ludicrously sci-fi and far-off right now , and they ’ ll remain so for a long time—until @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As with low-Earth orbit , outer space becomes much smaller and more cramped when you start thinking at commercial scale .
In any event , the moon is chiefly envisioned as a way-station project among the most ambitious cohort of space privatizers .
A settled moon colony would serve as the push-off point for the main event , commercially speaking , for New Space entrepreneurs : mining the asteroid belt .
Asteroids are almost comically rich in precious materials .
The asteroid Ryugu , for example , has about $ 82 billion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the “ Asterank ” asteroid-value–ranking project .
Another , Bennu , boasts a cool $ 669 million worth of iron and hydrogen .
“ You could totally collapse the gold and platinum market on Earth by mining asteroids , ” joked Jacob Haqq Misra , a senior research investigator with the Blue Marble Space Institute of Science , a nonprofit that encourages space exploration .
But there ’ s a hitch : Nobody has much of an idea how you ’ d actually mine an asteroid .
Despite what you ’ ve seen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ merely grabbing hold of a comparatively small , city-block–size object in microgravity is a forbidding physics puzzle—to say nothing of actually refining whatever you find .
One thing ’ s clear , however : In order to reach an asteroid , you ’ d need a lot of fuel for robotic probes .
( Oxygen , too , if you ’ re bringing along a human crew . )
This would likely be too expensive to do from Earth , given its gravity .
The moon , on the other hand , is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s commercial mining endeavors : enough gravity so humans can live in a base and assemble a rotating corps of mining robots , but sufficiently little gravity that launching mining probes at asteroids is easy .
“ It takes so much energy to escape Earth ’ s orbit , by the time you do that , you ’ re basically halfway to anywhere in the universe , ” Anderson said .
“ The moon as a launchpad—there ’ s a lot of commercial value there.
” Some New Space firms harbor still greater @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ civilizing mission ” that animated so many colonial land rushes in recent terrestrial history .
Jeff Bezos wants to build space stations that rotate fast enough to simulate Earth gravity—and large enough to host entire cities full of residents .
It ’ s a vision he built from a youth steeped in sci-fi .
At Princeton , he took a class with Gerard O ’ Neill , a physicist who ’ d been arguing since the 1960s that humanity had to slip the surly bonds of Earth in order to survive over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ argued that living in space and mining asteroids represented the only path forward for the human race to continue growing and prospering without laying waste to planet Earth .
He laid it out as a simple proposition of geology : If you were to mine the entire Earth down half a mile , leaving it a honeycombed crater , you ’ d still only get 1 percent of the metals and substances from the three biggest asteroids .
Bezos has eagerly endorsed the space-colony vision .
In the short term , Bezos ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the New Space entrepreneur : building rockets and spacecraft that NASA will hire in order to resume landing astronauts on the moon .
But in the long run—decades hence—building space colonies is , as he has argued , the only mission he can find big enough to devote his life and riches toward .
“ The only way that I can see to deploy this much financial resource , ” Bezos told Business Insider , “ is by converting my Amazon winnings into space travel.
” The unexpected costs of Bezos-style space exploitation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ distant—decades , at least .
But if there ’ s one thing we ’ ve learned from observing the human and environmental wreckage of the industrial era , it ’ s that history is like space travel : The path you set at the beginning is critical .
Changing course later on is much harder .
So it behooves us to plan now .
Are there ways to avoid the worst possible outcomes in space ?
How is commercial life in space going to unfold ?
The world ’ s small community of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , been increasingly pondering this , and they ’ ve come to some unsettling conclusions .
First off , they note , the big winners in space will likely be ... the big winners on Earth .
“ I think it ’ s going to benefit the wealthy people that are running these mining firms , ” Schwartz said bluntly .
There are , as New Space investors today will tell you , winner-take-all dynamics .
Bezos built a supply chain that is helping Amazon gradually dominate the world .
Space will probably @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
So in order to envision the future contours of space conquest , it ’ s probably a safe bet to take all the harms of monopoly we see on this planet and project them on to a literally cosmic scale .
And that leads , in turn , to a corollary prophecy : Human rights in space are likely to be execrable , if they ’ re left up to the private sector .
Consider that anyone working in space will be reliant upon their employer for the most basic stuff of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ food and water , but breathable oxygen , on a minute-by-minute basis .
Plenty of science fiction has , over the years , war-gamed the bleak implications of these precarious situations .
In Ridley Scott ’ s Alien ( 1979 ) , the employees of “ The Company ” are sent unwittingly to encounter a vicious alien life-form , with The Company hoping it would get a profitable specimen out of this .
More recently , the TV show The Expanse depicts the lives of asteroid miners as an outright form of slavery @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this as the typical pessimism of left-wing creative types—until one ponders workers ’ rights on Earth as they exist now .
Employees in Amazon ’ s warehouses are already peeing into bottles and collapsing from heat exhaustion in their attempt to satisfy their employer ’ s relentless work quotas ; imagine if the company also controlled their breathable air .
Charles Cockell is a professor of astrobiology at the University of Edinburgh who ’ s written at length about the question of freedom in space settlements .
He ’ s generally a libertarian @ @ @ @ @ @ @ concentrations of power in both governments and private-sector firms in space .
“ The controls on freedom of movement on the moon or Mars are worse than in North Korea , ” he told me .
“ You can ’ t just walk out of a settlement.
” Control of oxygen , he predicted , will empower the worst instincts of authoritarians of any stripe .
“ It will attract the coercively inclined and petty officialdom like all these things do… .
It will attract people who crave power .
You have to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” These thought experiments don ’ t all conclude in grim dead-ends , however .
There ’ s a whole arm of space ethics and philosophy devoted to asking the questions : Could the prospect of settling space positively serve society and justice ?
Could it offer up new ways of thinking about how we organize civic relations ?
Coping with scarcity in space might impel settlers to reconsider some of the basic tentpoles of Western society .
One is prison : On Mars , jailing someone would cost billions .
A settlement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nesvold noted , wonder , “ Is it even worth it ?
” They ’ d be far more liable to consider styles of justice that don ’ t involve locking people up .
The same goes for environmental thinking .
Water and air will be so precious to space settlers that “ the people who are living in space are going to be much more concerned about resource conservation , ” Schwartz said .
“ It could be the attitudes that we get there are ones that are helpful to send back @ @ @ @ @ @ @ idea of space as a fresh slate for political thinking is enticing .
But it ’ s hemmed in by the very nature of the market forces currently reaching for the skies .
Would any private-sector firms heading to space agree to limit their power when they ’ re beyond Earth ’ s grasp ?
Nesvold and Lucianne Walkowicz think it ’ s possible .
There is , they believe , a window of opportunity right now , while commercial space activity is still ramping up , to convince everyone in New Space—from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ crucial ) governmental clients—to take space ethics seriously .
They ’ ve been pursuing two tracks of inquiry along these lines : first , talking directly to New Space companies about the political , social , and environmental aspects of space exploitation .
( The smaller firms , Nesvold noted , are often eager to talk ; the big ones—the SpaceXs and Blue Origins—not so much . )
Walkowicz has also been holding public events to get everyday citizens to discuss , as she put it , “ becoming interplanetary.
” “ I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spaceflight cheaper and more sustainable , reusable , all of that stuff is great—I love watching rocket launches as much as the next person , ” Walkowicz told me .
But she wants a much broader cross-section of the public to have a voice on how space is used .
As she frames things , it ’ s a simple matter of public accountability : For all the self-mythologizing among New Space titans about the new , scrappy , and libertarian cast of modern space exploration , it ’ s still NASA—and by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s projected to supply the biggest revenue stream for much New Space activity today , and in the near future .
In other words , we the people are paying for many of these rocket launches , and the huge outlays that will help bankroll the hard stuff , like future human colonies on the moon .
So the public ought to have more input on how the projected settlement and exploitation of outer space actually happens .
Walkowicz and Nesvold want to create a bigger sample of people informed about the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people who ’ d lobby Congress to help lay down the new American road rules for space—from keeping orbits clean to the question of who gets to ride on those taxpayer-funded rockets in the first place .
Space , in other words , needs to be “ decolonized.
” That ’ s a coinage gaining currency among some space thinkers , including Lindy Elkins-Tanton .
She ’ s a planetary scientist with one foot in the world of New Space , and another in the world of space ethics .
She ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” project , which is launching a probe next year to explore the metallic asteroid Psyche .
On the one hand , she is herself benefiting directly from the lower costs that New Space has created , so she ’ s generally a fan of commercial interests making space more viable .
Her probe will launch on a SpaceX rocket , and it ’ s so much cheaper than NASA ’ s older launches that it makes her science far more affordable .
( “ I ’ m sure I ’ m not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ ll tell you : It ’ s a lot of money , ” she said . )
Yet as Elkins-Tanton noted , the story of new frontiers being settled is the history of colonization , fueled by moneyed interests .
Whether it was Europeans heading to North America or Africa or parts of Asia , it was generally huge state interests putting up the money for risk-taking explorers—with the explorers getting rich , the states amassing power , the new frontiers becoming gradually stripped of resources , and their indigenous populations either @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” as she and other New Space ethicists put it , would be a different route .
It ’ d be the act of exploring space with that history in mind , and working deliberately in concert to avoid its brutalities .
What would that mean ?
Elkins-Tanton argued , like Walkowicz and Nesvold , that any voyages to space need to have much greater democratic participation .
For years , she ’ s been organizing annual projects that bring together a disparate array of thinkers—astrophysicists , artists , indigenous scholars—to plan for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ might exist without becoming a human rights nightmare .
“ We need artists and philosophers and sociologists , psychologists and every other kind of person thinking about how we do this thing , ” she said .
This can sound , she admitted , touchy-feely .
But in her own work as an astronomer , the big-tent approach has paid off .
When Elkins-Tanton initially pitched the Psyche mission to NASA , she was competing with 28 other pitches , and asking NASA to commit $ 750 million .
To build her proposal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ down to the college interns , “ speak up ” about their concerns—how things could go wrong , and what unexpected outcomes of the project might be .
“ Our motto is , the best news is bad news brought early , ” she said .
“ You need everybody to be able to speak up.
” In her pitch to NASA , she touted her insistent culture of inclusion .
When NASA heads approved her mission over the other ones , they cited it as a crucial reason why .
“ To @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” she said .
“ So now I can stand up and say : Culture is not for the weak .
Culture is literally worth $ 750 million.
” It would be heartening if NASA seriously embraced this model .
Decolonizing the way we explore space would actually honor the incredible unknowns and unexpected dangers the sustained commercial settlement of the heavens will bring .
As John F. Kennedy said when he first argued for putting people on the moon : “ The greater our knowledge increases , the greater our ignorance @ @ @

But there’s a hitch: Nobody has much of an idea how you’d actually mine an asteroid. Despite what you’ve seen in lumbering sci-fi epics like Armageddon, merely grabbing hold of a comparatively small, city-block–size object in microgravity is a forbidding physics puzzle—to say nothing of actually refining whatever you find.
One thing’s clear, however: In order to reach an asteroid, you’d need a lot of fuel for robotic probes. (Oxygen, too, if you’re bringing along a human crew.) This would likely be too expensive to do from Earth, given its gravity. The moon, on the other hand, is a sweet spot to base one’s commercial mining endeavors: enough gravity so humans can live in a base and assemble a rotating corps of mining robots, but sufficiently little gravity that launching mining probes at asteroids is easy.
“It takes so much energy to escape Earth’s orbit, by the time you do that, you’re basically halfway to anywhere in the universe,” Anderson said. “The moon as a launchpad—there’s a lot of commercial value there.”
Some New Space firms harbor still greater plans, in line with the classic “civilizing mission” that animated so many colonial land rushes in recent terrestrial history. Jeff Bezos wants to build space stations that rotate fast enough to simulate Earth gravity—and large enough to host entire cities full of residents. It’s a vision he built from a youth steeped in sci-fi. At Princeton, he took a class with Gerard O’Neill, a physicist who’d been arguing since the 1960s that humanity had to slip the surly bonds of Earth in order to survive over the long haul. O’Neill argued that living in space and mining asteroids represented the only path forward for the human race to continue growing and prospering without laying waste to planet Earth. He laid it out as a simple proposition of geology: If you were to mine the entire Earth down half a mile, leaving it a honeycombed crater, you’d still only get 1 percent of the metals and substances from the three biggest asteroids.
Bezos has eagerly endorsed the space-colony vision. In the short term, Bezos’s plans are the standard-issue vision for the New Space entrepreneur: building rockets and spacecraft that NASA will hire in order to resume landing astronauts on the moon. But in the long run—decades hence—building space colonies is, as he has argued, the only mission he can find big enough to devote his life and riches toward. “The only way that I can see to deploy this much financial resource,” Bezos told Business Insider, “is by converting my Amazon winnings into space travel.”
The unexpected costs of Bezos-style space exploitation are, as yet, a little distant—decades, at least. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned from observing the human and environmental wreckage of the industrial era, it’s that history is like space travel: The path you set at the beginning is critical. Changing course later on is much harder. So it behooves us to plan now. Are there ways to avoid the worst possible outcomes in space? How is commercial life in space going to unfold?
The world’s small community of space ethicists has, in recent years, been increasingly pondering this, and they’ve come to some unsettling conclusions. First off, they note, the big winners in space will likely be ... the big winners on Earth. “I think it’s going to benefit the wealthy people that are running these mining firms,” Schwartz said bluntly. There are, as New Space investors today will tell you, winner-take-all dynamics. Bezos built a supply chain that is helping Amazon gradually dominate the world. Space will probably have room for only a few winners. So in order to envision the future contours of space conquest, it’s probably a safe bet to take all the harms of monopoly we see on this planet and project them on to a literally cosmic scale.
And that leads, in turn, to a corollary prophecy: Human rights in space are likely to be execrable, if they’re left up to the private sector.
Consider that anyone working in space will be reliant upon their employer for the most basic stuff of life. That’s not just food and water, but breathable oxygen, on a minute-by-minute basis. Plenty of science fiction has, over the years, war-gamed the bleak implications of these precarious situations. In Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979), the employees of “The Company” are sent unwittingly to encounter a vicious alien life-form, with The Company hoping it would get a profitable specimen out of this. More recently, the TV show The Expanse depicts the lives of asteroid miners as an outright form of slavery. One could, again, regard this as the typical pessimism of left-wing creative types—until one ponders workers’ rights on Earth as they exist now. Employees in Amazon’s warehouses are already peeing into bottles and collapsing from heat exhaustion in their attempt to satisfy their employer’s relentless work quotas; imagine if the company also controlled their breathable air.
Charles Cockell is a professor of astrobiology at the University of Edinburgh who’s written at length about the question of freedom in space settlements. He’s generally a libertarian, so he’s concerned about concentrations of power in both governments and private-sector firms in space.
“The controls on freedom of movement on the moon or Mars are worse than in North Korea,” he told me. “You can’t just walk out of a settlement.” Control of oxygen, he predicted, will empower the worst instincts of authoritarians of any stripe. “It will attract the coercively inclined and petty officialdom like all these things do…. It will attract people who crave power. You have to assume that that will lead to tyranny.”
These thought experiments don’t all conclude in grim dead-ends, however. There’s a whole arm of space ethics and philosophy devoted to asking the questions: Could the prospect of settling space positively serve society and justice? Could it offer up new ways of thinking about how we organize civic relations?
Coping with scarcity in space might impel settlers to reconsider some of the basic tentpoles of Western society. One is prison: On Mars, jailing someone would cost billions. A settlement would, as the astrophysicist and ethicist Nesvold noted, wonder, “Is it even worth it?” They’d be far more liable to consider styles of justice that don’t involve locking people up. The same goes for environmental thinking. Water and air will be so precious to space settlers that “the people who are living in space are going to be much more concerned about resource conservation,” Schwartz said. “It could be the attitudes that we get there are ones that are helpful to send back [to Earth].”
The idea of space as a fresh slate for political thinking is enticing. But it’s hemmed in by the very nature of the market forces currently reaching for the skies. Would any private-sector firms heading to space agree to limit their power when they’re beyond Earth’s grasp? Nesvold and Lucianne Walkowicz think it’s possible. There is, they believe, a window of opportunity right now, while commercial space activity is still ramping up, to convince everyone in New Space—from the firms to their early (and crucial) governmental clients—to take space ethics seriously. They’ve been pursuing two tracks of inquiry along these lines: first, talking directly to New Space companies about the political, social, and environmental aspects of space exploitation. (The smaller firms, Nesvold noted, are often eager to talk; the big ones—the SpaceXs and Blue Origins—not so much.) Walkowicz has also been holding public events to get everyday citizens to discuss, as she put it, “becoming interplanetary.”
“I think making the infrastructure of getting to spaceflight cheaper and more sustainable, reusable, all of that stuff is great—I love watching rocket launches as much as the next person,” Walkowicz told me. But she wants a much broader cross-section of the public to have a voice on how space is used. As she frames things, it’s a simple matter of public accountability: For all the self-mythologizing among New Space titans about the new, scrappy, and libertarian cast of modern space exploration, it’s still NASA—and by extension, the people’s treasury—that’s projected to supply the biggest revenue stream for much New Space activity today, and in the near future. In other words, we the people are paying for many of these rocket launches, and the huge outlays that will help bankroll the hard stuff, like future human colonies on the moon.
So the public ought to have more input on how the projected settlement and exploitation of outer space actually happens. Walkowicz and Nesvold want to create a bigger sample of people informed about the stakes in the new space race, people who’d lobby Congress to help lay down the new American road rules for space—from keeping orbits clean to the question of who gets to ride on those taxpayer-funded rockets in the first place.
Space, in other words, needs to be “decolonized.” That’s a coinage gaining currency among some space thinkers, including Lindy Elkins-Tanton. She’s a planetary scientist with one foot in the world of New Space, and another in the world of space ethics. She’s the head of the NASA “Psyche” project, which is launching a probe next year to explore the metallic asteroid Psyche. On the one hand, she is herself benefiting directly from the lower costs that New Space has created, so she’s generally a fan of commercial interests making space more viable. Her probe will launch on a SpaceX rocket, and it’s so much cheaper than NASA’s older launches that it makes her science far more affordable. (“I’m sure I’m not supposed to tell you, but I’ll tell you: It’s a lot of money,” she said.)
Yet as Elkins-Tanton noted, the story of new frontiers being settled is the history of colonization, fueled by moneyed interests. Whether it was Europeans heading to North America or Africa or parts of Asia, it was generally huge state interests putting up the money for risk-taking explorers—with the explorers getting rich, the states amassing power, the new frontiers becoming gradually stripped of resources, and their indigenous populations either killed or impoverished.
“Decolonization,” as she and other New Space ethicists put it, would be a different route. It’d be the act of exploring space with that history in mind, and working deliberately in concert to avoid its brutalities. What would that mean? Elkins-Tanton argued, like Walkowicz and Nesvold, that any voyages to space need to have much greater democratic participation. For years, she’s been organizing annual projects that bring together a disparate array of thinkers—astrophysicists, artists, indigenous scholars—to plan for things such as how a Mars colony might exist without becoming a human rights nightmare.
“We need artists and philosophers and sociologists, psychologists and every other kind of person thinking about how we do this thing,” she said. This can sound, she admitted, touchy-feely. But in her own work as an astronomer, the big-tent approach has paid off. When Elkins-Tanton initially pitched the Psyche mission to NASA, she was competing with 28 other pitches, and asking NASA to commit $750 million. To build her proposal, she insisted her team members, down to the college interns, “speak up” about their concerns—how things could go wrong, and what unexpected outcomes of the project might be. “Our motto is, the best news is bad news brought early,” she said. “You need everybody to be able to speak up.” In her pitch to NASA, she touted her insistent culture of inclusion. When NASA heads approved her mission over the other ones, they cited it as a crucial reason why.
“To them, it was a success metric,” she said. “So now I can stand up and say: Culture is not for the weak. Culture is literally worth $750 million.” It would be heartening if NASA seriously embraced this model. Decolonizing the way we explore space would actually honor the incredible unknowns and unexpected dangers the sustained commercial settlement of the heavens will bring. As John F. Kennedy said when he first argued for putting people on the moon: “The greater our knowledge increases, the greater our ignorance unfolds.”


newrepublic--2020-12-03--Joe Biden’s Cabinet Is a Lost Cause for the Left

But voice doesn ’ t always work and works only up to a point when it does .
The actual dynamics underpinning the relationships between the two parties and their dissidents today are worth examining .
While it would be easy to see Trump as a Goldwater-esque candidate who managed to prevail in 2016—the Republican establishment did not want him , a large and loud constituency did—he owed his victory in the primary less to the fervor of his supporters than to the establishment ’ s inability to solve a simple collective action problem .
Had there been just one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or eight , he might have been beaten .
And this year , on the Democratic side , elites did exactly what Republicans in 2016 failed to do : Had the field not shrunk before Super Tuesday , Sanders might have ridden modest plurality wins to the nomination even having lost in South Carolina ; in fact , his campaign was seemingly premised entirely on the assumption that this would be his path .
In the final analysis , both insurgencies were functionally defeated .
Barack Obama ’ s vice president will return @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he ’ s bringing many members of the Obama team back with him .
Meanwhile , Donald Trump is leaving the presidency as a more conventional Republican than he was when he came in .
His supporters don ’ t care in the slightest about Trump ’ s reversion , and establishment Republicans on the Hill can probably count on the support of most of them once they return to conventional austerity politics in January .
On both sides , there have been fewer substantive policy shifts than shifts in rhetoric and political @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for voice .
But what about exit ?
The structural barriers that would limit the viability of another alternative left-wing party in the United States have been written about extensively elsewhere and won ’ t be repeated here .
That said , it seems fairly clear at this point that the left should , somehow , put itself at a more meaningful remove from the Democratic Party—that it should abandon the notion it might significantly move Democratic elites from below , and instead build out a detached movement adjacent to the Democratic Party @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it makes strategic sense to do so .
Democratic socialists refer to this as an “ inside-outside ” strategy ; frankly the inside portion of the term should probably be dropped .
After all , a party that ’ s unwilling to turn over the reins even to younger moderates ideologically aligned with leadership isn ’ t ripe for further ideological transformation on a timescale adequate to meeting the crises the country faces , including , obviously , climate change .
Once the hope of transforming the Democratic Party is abandoned , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nebulous .
First , activists should identify specific policy questions where the White House might simply be browbeaten by direct action into doing the right thing .
The protests against the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines and the demonstrations that led to DACA under Obama were good examples of this .
In general , engagement with state and local politics should be deepened , especially given the success of progressive ballot initiatives , issue campaigns , and candidates in recent years .
Incumbent Democrats should continue to be primaried , but the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ abstract one : developing strategies for consistently winning federal elections outside of major cities without compromising on policy substance .
It ’ s entirely possible that this isn ’ t possible ; either way non-electoral efforts—labor organizing , mobilizing to provide direct aid to people who are struggling , particularly over the next few months as the coronavirus pandemic deepens and the economy worsens—will also be critical .

For instance, while the Republican Party would have been better off nominating a candidate far closer to the center of the general electorate in 1964, Goldwater won out, Hirschman noted, because activists in the party were loud, organized, and assertive enough to mount a viable bid for the nomination and control of the GOP. “A party which is beleaguered by protests from disgruntled members because they dislike proposed ‘wishy-washy’ platforms or policies will often be tempted to give in to these voices because they are very real here and now,” he wrote. “While the benefits that accrue from wishy-washiness are highly conjectural.” He went on to speculate that the influence of dissidents against wishy-washiness on parties might actually be deepened in political duopolies like the United States. Trapped inside the two parties with nowhere to go, the thinking went, dissidents work toward changes that might be less likely if they simply gave up and left.
But voice doesn’t always work and works only up to a point when it does. The actual dynamics underpinning the relationships between the two parties and their dissidents today are worth examining. While it would be easy to see Trump as a Goldwater-esque candidate who managed to prevail in 2016—the Republican establishment did not want him, a large and loud constituency did—he owed his victory in the primary less to the fervor of his supporters than to the establishment’s inability to solve a simple collective action problem. Had there been just one or two establishment candidates rather than seven or eight, he might have been beaten. And this year, on the Democratic side, elites did exactly what Republicans in 2016 failed to do: Had the field not shrunk before Super Tuesday, Sanders might have ridden modest plurality wins to the nomination even having lost in South Carolina; in fact, his campaign was seemingly premised entirely on the assumption that this would be his path.
In the final analysis, both insurgencies were functionally defeated. Barack Obama’s vice president will return to the White House as president, and he’s bringing many members of the Obama team back with him. Meanwhile, Donald Trump is leaving the presidency as a more conventional Republican than he was when he came in. His supporters don’t care in the slightest about Trump’s reversion, and establishment Republicans on the Hill can probably count on the support of most of them once they return to conventional austerity politics in January. On both sides, there have been fewer substantive policy shifts than shifts in rhetoric and political affect.


newrepublic--2020-12-03--The Future of Staying Home

The Future of Staying Home

A life lived indoors has long been viewed as the height of economic attainment : Elites relax in palatial compounds while couriers fetch packages and convey news of the dangerous world beyond the gates .
Even the restaurant is a relatively recent invention , a stop for harried travelers looking for a quick bite before it became a place people would go to voluntarily .
Long before the pandemic closed down many public spaces , people in developed countries already spent 90 percent of their time indoors ; they are , largely , creatures of malls , suburban homes , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the occasional jog or day at the beach .
Modern Americans might like to imagine themselves as dogs , yearning to leap out the back door and run free , but they are actually cats , content with a sunny spot to stretch out in .
Yet what we want from indoor spaces is changing .
Increasingly , our houses and apartments are more than a place to recharge .
They are the last defense against germs , fire , flooding , and heat .
In early 2020 , Australians holed up at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pollution in the world caused by wildfire smoke .
This may become a seasonal event in many parts of the world , including most of California , which has seen over 7,000 fires this year alone .
Those unaffected by fire sought refuge indoors as the coronavirus spread across the world in spring ; by mid-April all but five U.S. states had issued some form of shelter-in-place order , and over 100 counties instituted lockdowns .
With office buildings and schools closed , home has also become the workplace and the classroom during @ @ @ @ @ @ @ same four walls .
In the near future , homes will have to be outfitted not just for leisure , work , and childcare , but as field hospitals , quarantine wards , air purification boxes , cooling centers , and , perhaps , even as pontoons .
The majority of buildings in the United States are still “ ticky-tacky little boxes ” or the bigger boxes of Walmarts and office parks , but that era is ending quickly .
In her book The Great Indoors : The Surprising Science of How Buildings @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Emily Anthes traces a shift toward purpose-built structures that will use data and smart-home features to respond to the environment .
Cities with enough resources to embrace this future will soon have energy-efficient homes , offices , and institutional buildings that are equipped with air purification , water recycling , climate control technologies , and more .
The new “ super home ” will not just be able to activate solar panels on a sunny day , it will also use sensors to monitor your moods and direct a ray of sunshine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

A life lived indoors has long been viewed as the height of economic attainment: Elites relax in palatial compounds while couriers fetch packages and convey news of the dangerous world beyond the gates. Even the restaurant is a relatively recent invention, a stop for harried travelers looking for a quick bite before it became a place people would go to voluntarily. Long before the pandemic closed down many public spaces, people in developed countries already spent 90 percent of their time indoors; they are, largely, creatures of malls, suburban homes, and automobile interiors, who go for the occasional jog or day at the beach. Modern Americans might like to imagine themselves as dogs, yearning to leap out the back door and run free, but they are actually cats, content with a sunny spot to stretch out in.
The Great Indoors: The Surprising Science of How Buildings Shape our Behavior, Health and Happiness by Emily Anthes Buy on Bookshop
Yet what we want from indoor spaces is changing. Increasingly, our houses and apartments are more than a place to recharge. They are the last defense against germs, fire, flooding, and heat. In early 2020, Australians holed up at home to protect against the worst air pollution in the world caused by wildfire smoke. This may become a seasonal event in many parts of the world, including most of California, which has seen over 7,000 fires this year alone. Those unaffected by fire sought refuge indoors as the coronavirus spread across the world in spring; by mid-April all but five U.S. states had issued some form of shelter-in-place order, and over 100 counties instituted lockdowns. With office buildings and schools closed, home has also become the workplace and the classroom during this time, often both within the same four walls. In the near future, homes will have to be outfitted not just for leisure, work, and childcare, but as field hospitals, quarantine wards, air purification boxes, cooling centers, and, perhaps, even as pontoons.


newrepublic--2020-11-27--How The Queen’s Gambit Reimagined Chess

How The Queen’s Gambit Reimagined Chess

In 2002 , an American player named Jennifer Shahade , who bears a more than passing similarity to Beth Harmon , became the youngest women ’ s U.S. chess champion in history .
Subsequently , she was awarded the title Woman Grandmaster by the international chess organization , FIDE ( the acronym is French ) .
Like Harmon , Shahade was once glamorously featured on the cover of America ’ s preeminent chess magazine .
She too has a flamboyant head of red hair—albeit less scrutinized than Harmon ’ s much-discussed crowning glory—and like the character in the show , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ embracing fashion and travel .
She plays the game with Harmon ’ s same attacking style , which is a significant plot point in the story .
To be clear , Shahade can ’ t be the inspiration for the character , as she was only three when Tevis ’ s novel first appeared .
She even recalls not finishing the book—despite the similarities to her own story—when she first found it amid the teenage throes of her early chess obsession .
Shahade has become an important face of the game , challenging @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and conservative politics .
The cover of her first book , Chess Bitch : Women in the Ultimate Intellectual Sport , featured the author posing in a pink wig , a pink spaghetti-strap top , a pink scarf , and furry pink gloves , and her second book , examining the games of prominent female players , was entitled Play Like a Girl .
In addition , Shahade has staged a number of chess-themed art installation pieces and events , performed or conducted in the spirit of artist Marcel Duchamp , for whom @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the subject of Shahade ’ s third , co-authored book .
Alongside Shahade ’ s own efforts , several other changes in the world of chess have broadened the game ’ s appeal .
The current World Champion , Magnus Carlsen , a 29-year-old Norwegian with a dry wit and a willingness to offer kind words for his opponents , has served as a much more attractive figurehead for the game than many of his predecessors .
( Anyone convinced that chess is a toy should watch the first five minutes of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . )
The St. Louis chess club achieved international status as a venue for major tournaments and launched philanthropic efforts to stress the game ’ s supposed intellectual benefits .
A Chess in the Schools program contributed to the recognition of the game as an art , as well as a sport , making it fundable from sources that were previously unavailable to it .
The U.S .
Chess Federation became a 501c3 nonprofit , representing a change in mission from promoting chess to improving people ’ s lives through the game .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ featuring a robust lineup of male and female commentators on tournaments covered live from all over the world , have revolutionized how the game is consumed by fans .
In Fischer ’ s day—and even 20 years ago—it was rare to see grand masters actually play chess .
Today , it ’ s possible to observe the world ’ s leading players virtually around the clock .
Even the pandemic may have contributed to the popularity of both chess and The Queen ’ s Gambit .
If too much time at home has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which dedication and perseverance is duly rewarded , then chess offers the opportunity for both intellectual challenge and a welcoming community , at a time when those things are difficult to find .

The chess community in The Queen’s Gambit is far more benign than the hostile, madness-inducing, chess-as-battlefield-of-the-Cold War image that has cemented itself in the American psyche.
Not accidentally, I think, Fischer has been excised from the world of The Queen’s Gambit. The prodigious rise of Harmon (Anya Taylor-Joy), who is a teenager in the 1960s, would have overlapped perfectly with Fischer’s rise toward the world championship. But he’s completely absent from the story—obliquely referenced only once when one of Harmon’s love interests, Benny Watts (Thomas Brodie-Sangster), is referred to by the wrong name. Instead, the show is imagining the history that might have unfurled had Fischer not been a paranoid, misogynistic, antisemitic cultist (it’s really too much to go into in detail) but rather an impassioned, inquisitive, and charismatic young woman fixed on beating back her demons and excelling at the game.
In flashback, Harmon miraculously survives her mother’s desperate murder-suicide plot, and in the first episode, she is adopted at about 12 years old. The stories of both her birth family and her adopted family are instructive in just how determinedly men can attempt to prevent women from expressing ambition and achieving independence. Her birth mother is a Ph.D. in mathematics, and her adopted mother is a talented pianist—math and music are an intellectual stone’s throw from chess—yet each suffered a husband who ridiculed and abandoned her. To break into the chess world, Harmon must penetrate a layer of midcentury misogyny—claims that women don’t play chess or don’t stand a chance against male players—but once she does so, the game offers her a benign father figure and provides her with her first experiences of true kindness and respect. Another female player, whom she has just defeated, comes to her rescue when she has her first period. In subsequent tournaments, the male chess players she dispatches react with awe rather than anger.
The show owes not a little to the Pygmalion–My Fair Lady story, in that chess itself is Harmon’s tutor: Through her stoic chess teacher and the blocky aesthetic of the game, she learns manners and develops both her critical faculties and an appreciation of abstract beauty. And eventually, chess shows her that men—in the form of gentlemanly Russian grand masters—can be steely and competitive, yet also capable of looking past ideology and gender to value raw genius. In short, she finds that the arena of chess is a true meritocracy.


newrepublic--2020-12-03--The Media Is Finally Tuning Trump Out

The Media Is Finally Tuning Trump Out

The pulling away from Trump is in many ways obvious , beginning with the fact that he is not receiving the same level of media attention because he lost the election and is seemingly bent on using the lame-duck period for nothing beyond carping about that loss .
It was hardly accidental that networks finally found a capacity to cut away from his incoherent speeches once it became clear that he hadn ’ t won a second term : What Joe Biden has to say during this time has more bearing on the future .
In seven weeks , Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ used to batter the press over the last four years , and the only outlets that have stuck with the president devotedly have been the ones that have encouraged their audience to believe Trump ’ s gaudy voter-fraud claims—such as the Trump-approved , low-rent right-wing networks One America News and Newsmax , both of which have managed to siphon off audience from other conservative outlets of late—likely in the hopes that Trump will remember their fealty during his postpresidency .
Additionally , the media has an obligation to turn off the president at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ offer is lies that damage American democracy .
There ’ s no logical incentive to bend over backward to accommodate the president ’ s deceptions and fantasies .
Depriving the president ’ s reprehensible commentary of oxygen , moreover , is a great way for the media to ingratiate itself with the incoming Biden administration .
It ’ s also probably just a good business decision : Covering Trump ’ s wild pageants of deceit over the past month has likely not been the ratings bonanza offered by his 2016 rallies .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turning away is also something of an overcorrection , in which , after years of lavishing Trump with attention , the decision has been made to start making up for a long run of bad behavior ; to have their cake and eat it , too .
For years , the legacy media and cable news feasted on a smorgasbord of Trump ’ s lies .
Now , at the twilight of his presidency , they ’ re choosing to cosplay Edward R. Murrow .
“ Trump is so far gone that I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ substance of a 46-minute spiel that he spewed tonight , ” CNN ’ s Chris Cuomo said on Wednesday .
“ It is lies and ugly suggestions that have a basis in nothing but division and malice .
It is a spiel , it is a con only to benefit his own coffers , as followers continue , most in good faith , to donate to a cause for an alleged billionaire , despite the fact that that cause is already over.
” ( When was this presidency something other than “ a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his own coffers , ” though ? )

The pulling away from Trump is in many ways obvious, beginning with the fact that he is not receiving the same level of media attention because he lost the election and is seemingly bent on using the lame-duck period for nothing beyond carping about that loss. It was hardly accidental that networks finally found a capacity to cut away from his incoherent speeches once it became clear that he hadn’t won a second term: What Joe Biden has to say during this time has more bearing on the future. In seven weeks, Trump will lose the bully pulpit he has used to batter the press over the last four years, and the only outlets that have stuck with the president devotedly have been the ones that have encouraged their audience to believe Trump’s gaudy voter-fraud claims—such as the Trump-approved, low-rent right-wing networks One America News and Newsmax, both of which have managed to siphon off audience from other conservative outlets of late—likely in the hopes that Trump will remember their fealty during his postpresidency.
Additionally, the media has an obligation to turn off the president at a moment when all he has to offer is lies that damage American democracy. There’s no logical incentive to bend over backward to accommodate the president’s deceptions and fantasies. Depriving the president’s reprehensible commentary of oxygen, moreover, is a great way for the media to ingratiate itself with the incoming Biden administration. It’s also probably just a good business decision: Covering Trump’s wild pageants of deceit over the past month has likely not been the ratings bonanza offered by his 2016 rallies.
For years, the legacy media and cable news feasted on a smorgasbord of Trump’s lies. Now, at the twilight of his presidency, they’re choosing to cosplay Edward R. Murrow.
In this sense, the media’s turning away is also something of an overcorrection, in which, after years of lavishing Trump with attention, the decision has been made to start making up for a long run of bad behavior; to have their cake and eat it, too. For years, the legacy media and cable news feasted on a smorgasbord of Trump’s lies. Now, at the twilight of his presidency, they’re choosing to cosplay Edward R. Murrow. “Trump is so far gone that I cannot in good conscience play the substance of a 46-minute spiel that he spewed tonight,” CNN’s Chris Cuomo said on Wednesday. “It is lies and ugly suggestions that have a basis in nothing but division and malice. It is a spiel, it is a con only to benefit his own coffers, as followers continue, most in good faith, to donate to a cause for an alleged billionaire, despite the fact that that cause is already over.” (When was this presidency something other than “a spiel … a con only to benefit his own coffers,” though?)