Driving While Republican?

Monday, April 19, 2021 

Saturday's puzzle -- 10 Down = Homecomings?

. . .

"Least Vaccinated U.S. Counties Have Something in Common: Trump Voters."   https://nyti.ms/3x0v9bj 

Surprised?

. . .

The Forward has been a vital part of New York life for almost 125 years.  For many decades, it was the most influential newspaper among Yiddish-speaking immigrants, introducing them to the manners and mores of a society they never could have imagined back in Eastern Europe.  In recent years, the pressures of the digital world forced it solely on-line in both Yiddish and English.

But, no one's perfect and an article about a New York City mayoral candidate's description of Israeli policy as apartheid evoked this response from me.

Labelling Dianne Morales as "one of the leading candidates for mayor of New York City" is a serious distortion of the facts.  The poll cited in your article places her 7th of 8 named candidates.  

This is a scare technique meant to agitate your Jewish readers by inflating the standing of a marginal candidate who has uttered the feared "A" word.

The editor answered me quickly, claiming that "we and virtually all other media have been referring to the top 8-10 in polls as 'leading.' . . . [While] Yang, Adams, Stringer and Wiley are generally described as the 'top.'"  So, I guess we will have to resort to Cole Porter.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6oGytt0Hiw

. . .

Confusion about choice of words also arose in another context.  It seems that gender fluidity is a subject that the Social Security generation has some trouble with.  If we seem to be lacking in empathy or even understanding, communications may be part of the problem along with lack of experience with the subject.  An article this weekend quoted a person identified by the reporter as "a nonbinary lesbian," presumably at the person's suggestion or request, although it's possible that the reporter left the house in the morning looking for someone to put that label on.   https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/15/nyregion/lesbian-bars-new-york-city.html

In any case, my immediate concern is language.  What then constitutes a lesbian?  Isn't being a woman a precondition of being a lesbian?  

. . .

Stony Brook Steve and I headed to Pastrami Queen, 138 West 72nd Street, to take advantage of their Monday special, pastrami on rye, pickles and Dr. Brown's soda for $14.95, a 35% discount.  When the pastrami is running right, this is a great deal.  There are two things to regard, however.  Only pastrami is covered as of now; corned beef, roast beef et alia are at full retail, $20 for the sandwich alone.  Second, this deal applies Mondays to in-house only, no takeout.  However, management construes in-house somewhat broadly to include the two small tables on the sidewalk in front of the store.  Go for it.

Tuesday, April 20, 2021

Thanks to Gentleman Jerry for sending this article about the happy confluence of bagels and Italy.  

https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2021/04/15/rome-beehive-bagels-hostel/

When I have eaten bagels outside the Holy Land, with or without use of my passport, I have been disappointed.  My expectations have diminished over time, but, as Rome is on my short list of next destinations, I am happy to use this as further incentive to get going.

. . .

Writing about food this weekend, the New York Times got its chronology mixed up.  It claimed that its food writer "broke news of an innovation in the world of hamburgers: the cheeseburger," in 1947.   https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/07/magazine/lime-pie-recipe-jane-nickerson.html

However, it cross-references its own article from 1938 that "Discovers the Cheeseburger."  https://www.nytimes.com/times-insider/2015/05/27/1938-the-times-discovers-the-cheeseburger/

The origins of the cheeseburger are even muddier, with several creditable versions, all dating from well before 1938.  See the Origins section in the Wikipedia entry.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheeseburger

As a nice (?) Jewish boy, brought up in a conventional home in Brooklyn, I grew up with the laws of kashrut, Kosher food, primarily the separation of milchigs and fleishigs, dairy products and meat products (with a dispensation for Chinese food, of course).  A cheeseburger was inherently illegal.  As a result, my first encounter with a cheeseburger probably took place in graduate school, when I was no longer living at home.  Also, while I worked summers and Saturdays throughout college, my disposable income was limited and disposed of cautiously.  Why spend my limited funds on the possibility of eternal damnation?

I have strayed afar from those days, but I have to admire the resolve of my kinfolk who have consistently avoided cheeseburgers, sausage/meatball/pepperoni pizzas and veal parmigiana.  While their ultimate reward is unknown, I think that they undoubtedly have been spared some indigestion along the way.

Wednesday, April 21, 2021

Recently, in a local dispute, "you and others with your privilege" were chided for "narrow" thinking.  That "you" was me, of course.  The criticism had some merit, I admit, especially coming from a professor at an Ivy League university, someone well acquainted with privilege.

Thursday, April 22, 2021

I'm struggling to find a way to combine this headline with Jerry Seinfeld's "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee" and James Corden's "Carpool Karaoke": "Proposed G.O.P. Bills Protect Drivers Who Hit Protestors With Cars."

. . .

A study of "30 million change-of-address requests to the U.S. Postal Service in 2020 show that with these two very visible exceptions — and a few smaller ones — migration patterns during the pandemic have looked a lot like migration patterns before it."  Metropolitan New York and the Bay Area, both heavily populated by desk-bound employees, had net outflows in 2020 at twice the rate of 2019.

https://nyti.ms/3go6uYd

• Tenants - Happy
• Landlords - Unhappy
• Rapid transit ridership - Down
• Gasoline  prices - Up
• Neighborhood stores - Declining
• Amazon shipments - Increasing 

And you?

 

Friday, April 23, 2021

The Upper West Side's Power Couple are heading this afternoon to Massachusetts to join in the celebration of our oldest grandchild's B'nai Mitzvah.  This is the sort of occasion that fills you with immense joy while reminding you how old you are.  

Only immediate family will be present during services, with Zoomers from all over the US and Israel.  It would have taken the most drastic quarantine measures to keep Bubbe and Grandpa Alan away.   We are both fully vaccinated and tested Covid negative in the last few days, thus making us the most welcome guests since Elijah. 

. . .

Just as I was going out the door, my inbox caught this article from Time Out New York.  https://www.timeout.com/newyork/restaurants/15-best-bagels-in-new-york-ranked?cid=email~emailname%3DNEW%20YORK_NEWSLETTER_20210422~jobid%3DDM601~crmid%3Dbcdd6f27-0494-4cc2-ad74-937452b53c2a

Claiming to identify "The best bagels in NYC" may trigger divorces, end friendships, cause family feuds and/or provoke urban unrest.  However, concentrating on the very special nature of the weekend, I remained calm, at least until we return on Monday.

. . .

Answer = RUNS

Restoring Circulation

 Monday, April 12, 2021

"How Epidemiologists Are Planning to Vacation With Their Unvaccinated Kids"

https://nyti.ms/3wBFj21

 

Our in-house epidemiologist has made very limited vacation plans even though she and her superannuated kid are both fully vaccinated.  They plan to attend #1 grandson's Bar Mitzvah later this month, near Boston, with barely a dozen other people physically present.  They are pondering another Bar Mitzvah in June, which would require a cross-country flight.  And that's it for now.  The unused tickets to London and Tel Aviv remain unredeemed and whether they are irredeemable is still to be determined.

. . .

 

Here is a valuable article on the ethnocentric nature of New York politics, city and state.  https://forward.com/culture/466857/once-the-staple-of-new-york-politics-giuliani-andrew-yang-john-lindsay/

 

The ethno that is centric in this case is Jewish, the necessity for candidates to show their delight in Jewish food, specifically the knish.  I will spare you a primer on knishes, but I have to offer valuable guidance.  

 

Yonah Schimmel Knish Bakery, 137 East Houston Street, is properly cited as the quintessential source of knishes in the known Universe.

http://www.knishery.com/menu/

 

Just scrolling through the illustrated menu will assuage all but the most rabid anti-Semite.  However, don't eat a Yonah Schimmel knish!  I don't mean never.  Order your knishes to take home.  Don't expect to eat them on the premises, because they use a microwave oven to heat them up.  This brings moisture to the surface and results in a limp-crusted knish.  You want, nay deserve, a crisp-crusted knish, which a few minutes in a conventional oven, even a toaster oven, will produce.  This is the very essence of delayed gratification, believe me.

. . .

 

This is 2021 and yet "for every dollar a typical white household has, a Black one has 12 cents."      

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/business/economy/racial-wealth-gap.html

 

Long-established governmental and institutional policies have produced this result.  The most diligent efforts of individuals and families were only rarely able to overcome the discriminatory burdens on Black people.  See, for example, Richard Rothstein, "The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America" or Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, "Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership."

 

This is not the measure of a healthy society.

 

Tuesday, April 13, 2021

Yesterday, the Upper West Side's Power Couple did something that we never did before.  We went to a wedding on a Monday.  In the past, we have attended many weddings, typically on a Saturday or Sunday.  Once, we even went to a wedding on a Thursday.  While a Monday wedding was not on our bucket list, it is now checked off.  (I don't believe in bucket lists, but that's for another time.)

 

It wasn't the very first time, but last night, for the first time since June 2017, I wore cufflinks.  It was a very grownup feeling, in contrast to the infantilizing lockdown/quarantine period. 

. . .

 

Going back further than 3 years and 10 months, here are the 13 original rules of basketball, which fit on one page.

https://www.usab.com/history/dr-james-naismiths-original-13-rules-of-basketball.aspx

 

Today's National Basketball Association rule book has added a 14th rule, but takes 72 pages to identify them all.   https://dochub.com/alangotthelf/pqb0g5YRqy1g11YRJ2nx67/2020-21-nba-official-rules-pdf

  

This very day, Major League Baseball is violating one of the cardinal rules of baseball, one that probably reaches back into the 19th century, and is written in the heart of every fan.  As a result of bad weather over the last few days, the Mets are playing a doubleheader.  Fans will see two games for the price of one, something once commonplace, but not so much anymore.

 

Nu, Grandpa Alan?  What's wrong with that?  Well, I'll tell you.  Each game will be only 7 innings long instead of the 9 inscribed on one of the tablets Moses found too heavy to carry.  This shameless travesty on sacred practice has been a supposed rule since last year.  Even if the Mets won both, 4-3 and 4-0, it shouldn't be allowed.  

 

Wednesday, April 14, 2021

With at least a one-day break from wet and clammy weather, Gentleman Jerry, Al S. and I had lunch outdoors at Tacombi, 377 Amsterdam Avenue, one of 9 locations in this growing local Mexican food chain.  I have returned here several times during the year of the plague, because of the good food and the relatively comfortable outdoor dining arrangements.

 

We shared guacamole ($12.95).  I then had the Enseneda burrita, fried Alaskan cod, beans, cabbage, spicy escabeche (vinegary marinade), salsa and roasted poblano mayonnaise wrapped in a tortilla ($12.95), while the other guys had quesadillas, mushroom ($6.95) and chicken ($7.95).  The chef must have had a good weekend, because everything was quite tasty.

 

Thursday, April 15, 2021

Cindy and David were married in my presence in 1981.  They now live in Charlotte, North Carolina after spells in Chicago, Illinois, St. Petersburg, Florida, Edinburgh, Scotland, Lincolnton, North Carolina, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and Aberdeen, Scotland.  For the last few days, they have been in this area visiting family and friends and we had the pleasure of their company at lunch through a pouring rain.

 

We met at Telly's Taverna, 28-13 23rd Avenue, Astoria, a classic Greek seafood restaurant.  Even though we are all fully vaccinated, outdoor dining is still our chosen modus operandi, but Telly's teepee was leaking badly.  So, we occupied only the second table of the 30 or so in the large restaurant. 

 

David and I had lamb chops ($38), Cindy, grilled sardines ($22) and my conscience, grilled red snapper ($38).  We started with a large plate of dips --  yogurt-based tzatziki, garlicky potato skordalia and a rich hummus ($18).  This was the best food of the afternoon, but ample wine and great conversation kept the affair at a high level.

. . .

 

In its own words, "YouGov is an international research data and analytics group headquartered in London."  It is drawing attention with a ranking of the states by Americans.

https://today.yougov.com/topics/travel/articles-reports/2021/04/13/us-states-ranked-best-worst-according-americans

 

While we are not the only country of federated states, I just don't think that the Swiss or the Germans are as devoted to their home turf as we Americans are.  Going a step deeper, I believe that city looms larger than state here in the five boroughs, and that Los Angeles and San Francisco do no more than share  license plates. 

 

However, we see how politically powerful state identity remains overall in the Electoral College and the United States Senate.  In any case, New Jersey has to be embarrassed by having only Mississippi and Alabama below it.

. . .

 

Crime doesn't pay, right?  "Last month, the Sacklers offered to pay $4.275 billion from their personal fortune in an attempt to end thousands of lawsuits that have been filed against the company."   https://nyti.ms/3mBXWOz

 

Friday, April 16, 2021

Stony Brook Steve and I ventured over to Mimi Cheng's Dumplings, 309 Amsterdam Avenue, where I was frustrated the instant they opened their doors a few weeks ago, because they lacked outdoor seating.  Now, a few tables sit on the sidewalk and we were ready to be delighted.

 

Unfortunately, we were barely pleased.  Steve had steamed vegetable dumplings ($12.95 for 8), hefty at a hefty price.  I started with a scallion pancake ($6.50), small, 6" diameter, and too brittle.  Then, how could I resist the Matzo Ball Wonton Soup ($14.95)?  8 "wontons with fluffy matzo ball filling and parmesan [!]" in a piping hot, dill-laden chicken broth.  The soup itself was perfect on this chilly afternoon, but the cross-cultural wontons failed to impress.   

. . .

The Democrats in Washington have taken up the subject of the structure of the Supreme Court.  Until recently, you could count me as a conservative on fiddling with the size and terms of membership.  Now, objections are raised to any change, because it would supposedly erode the public’s trust in the legitimacy of the Court.  That reasoning was swept away by Mitch McConnell and his shameful disregard of the presidency and the Court when Antonin Scalia's death caused a vacancy in February 2016, 9 months before the presidential election.  With the Republicans treating a Supreme Court seat with the same dignity as the Seminole County, Florida tax collector, I say "Full speed ahead."  My list of additions starts with Jane C. Ginsburg, professor at the Columbia University School of Law, and, incidentally, Ruth Bader Ginsburg's daughter.

 

The Poverty of Riches

Monday, April 5, 2021

Give credit to Fox News for its dogged investigative reporting that produced this shocking news.  The woman, possibly an illegal alien from Guatemala, who seduced a young, inexperienced Florida congressman, had attended a gender reveal party at the same apartment complex where a first cousin of Hunter Biden ("as close as brothers") lived.  As Fox sees it, this raises serious questions about the current occupant of the White House.

. . .

 

Last week's blog stirred up the seafaring folk, but also drew some valuable comments on balancing the translator with the author.  One professional translator/interpreter wrote: "Of course, having a man translate a piece entitled 'What being a woman means to me,' is unlikely to be applauded.  But just look at all the brilliant female characters created by male writers, in works such as those by Shakespeare, Flaubert, or Tolstoy!  Or are writers/painters not supposed to depict people of other nationalities/races/religions?  Is 'political correctness' supposed to lead to an 'artistic correctness' which would mean nothing more than the death of the arts."  She continues: "And if the translator’s identity had to mirror the identity of the subject of the translation, almost nothing would ever get/ever have been translated!  Some of the most interesting interpretations I ever did . . . were of statements by people with whose views I violently disagreed."

 

Arthur Dobrin, novelist, poet, essayist, addressed another topic on last week's menu.  "One way out of the endless drive to find an unblemished person is to forgo naming buildings after people altogether.  Let the accomplishments of the dead speak for themselves, in all their complexity."

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/am-i-right/202102/the-cancel-culture

 

On the other hand, doesn't a society need its heroes, real or imagined?  Ultimately, some myth binds a group together and elevating someone as its representative aids cohesion.

. . .

 

My family, as so many others, began its American life in Manhattan, in the cramped quarters of the lower East Side, migrating to the wide open spaces of Brooklyn when the opportunity arose.  In 1950, 8 of the 9 Gotthelf/Goldenberg households, containing all of my closest relatives, were in Brooklyn, most within walking distance of each other.  The one outlier was in the borough of Queens.  By 1980, only one of a greater number of our households remained in Brooklyn, most outside the city limits. 

 

My grandparents and many like them in the first half of the 20th century left Manhattan for Brooklyn when they could afford a little better housing, to improve their standard of living.  Movement in the second half of the century from Manhattan was propelled by soaring housing costs, that is to preserve the standard of living.  This accounts for my surprise in reading this article about the rent gap between Manhattan and Brooklyn, once cavernous, now closing fast.  https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/01/realestate/the-brooklyn-manhattan-rent-gap-is-shrinking-fast.html

 

Another indicator of the on-going shift in respectability is the presence in Brooklyn of 9 of the 64 New York restaurants with a Michelin star, if you can still remember what going to a restaurant was like. 

. . .

 

Speaking of unspeakable wealth, did you know that "at least 55 of America's largest [companies] paid no taxes last year on billions of dollars in profits"?  https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/business/economy/zero-corporate-tax.html

 

Maybe you have the wrong accountant.

 

Tuesday, April 6, 2021

I think that baseball more than any other sport is played in the past as well as in the present.  We compare players and teams to their own past performances and to the players and teams that went before them.  And, looking back, the issue of race permeates the history of baseball, as it does so many corners of American life. 

 

Henry Aaron's great accomplishment of breaking Babe Ruth's career home run record made him the target of ugly racism.  "In 1974, Aaron set the Guiness World Record for most fan mail received in one year by a private citizen.  That year, the U.S. Postal Department confirmed that Aaron received 900,000 letters, about a third of which 'were letters of hate engendered by his bettering of Babe Ruth's career record.'"  

https://people.com/sports/hank-aaron-used-hate-mail-for-inspiration-before-breaking-babe-ruth-record/

 

On his way to breaking the record, Aaron said: "If I was white, all America would be proud of me."  Actually, that wasn't even true in 1961 when Roger Maris broke Ruth’s single-season home run record in competition with his teammate Mickey Mantle.  "The 1961 season should have been a time for really enjoying the game, but it was far from that.  While the M&M boys were trying to help their team win, Roger was getting hate mail, death threats, and even a phone call with a threat to kidnap his kids.  He got taunted on the road and at home, and he got booed whether he hit a home run or struck out."

https://syndication.bleacherreport.com/amp/64226-61-in-61-remembering-the-day-roger-maris-passed-babe-ruth.amp.html

 

Sports Illustrated reported that "Maris ended up battling not only American League pitchers but also public opinion and, sadly, baseball itself."  The New York Times later wrote, "How The Press Hounded Roger Maris."  

https://www.nytimes.com/1998/08/30/weekinreview/word-for-word-sports-journalism-1961-62-one-for-records-press-hounded-roger.html

 

I am not suggesting that Aaron had it no harder than Maris.  Racist tropes often were grounded in actual violence, resonating over and above ordinary insults or threats.  My only conclusion here is borrowed from an academic source, which itself sounds a bit naive: "Much of what is called public opinion is not really opinion.  An opinion presupposes extensive and accurate knowledge on the question under consideration and a reasoned judgment or conclusion reached by deliberate thought.  Many so-called opinions are rather prejudices or beliefs or hasty conclusions of traditional dogmas."  https://www.politicalscienceview.com/nature-of-public-opinion/

. . .

 

An obituary for the playwright Arthur Kopit reminded me how time flies.  It identified a play that he wrote in 1999, titled “Y2K”.  "The title, a term used in countless news headlines, referred to the widespread fear that the beginning of the year 2000 would confuse computer calendars to the extent that planes would fall out of the sky."  You know, kids, it was like when you had to go into a store to buy something.

. . .

 

Happy to be fully vaccinated and having had time to rest after crossing the Sinai Desert, Stony Brook Steve and I headed to Flushing, Queens, the location of another large Chinatown.  Steve trusted my choice of Asian Jewels Seafood Restaurant, 133-30 39th Avenue, for lunch, a very large establishment, with outdoor dining and its own parking lot according to my research.

 

Of course, once we got out there, we found that Asian Jewels's tent had blown down in a storm.  And, the crowded sidewalks of Flushing's Chinatown did not provide much room for outdoor tables and chairs.  While we are both 99 and 44/100% pure, we remain respectful of the CDC guidelines and seek to eat only outdoors.  Since no alternatives appeared in view, Steve pointed to the several cops standing in front of the 109th police precinct as a source of information.  I don't want to sound racist, but the three non-Asian, non-Jewish, white cops could not name a local Chinese restaurant in the middle of Chinatown.  Pizza maybe?

 

Steve and I moved on and stepped into the first plywood structure we found, Chung Moo Korean Restaurant, 39-04 Union Street.  The fried dumplings ($9 for 10 pieces) were very good and, having no ill will towards the Korean people generally, that's all I choose to say.

. . .

For the many of you who share my interest in copyright law, here is a good overview of the current state of confusion.  https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/arts/design/warhol-copyright-appeals-court.html

 

Copyright, which generally prohibits unauthorized use of creative work, explicitly conflicts with the protection of speech and the press in the First Amendment of the Constitution.  This is perfectly Kosher, however, because Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the Constitution, written before any amendments were added, codified the protection of copyrights, a legal principle of British common law that long preceded the independence of the United States.

"Transformation" is the magic word that protects a work that resembles another from a claim of infringement.  If the newer work is transformative, it is considered a "fair use" of the original.  When Andy Warhol produced a multi-colored, silk screen version of someone else's black-and-white photograph, it was found to be transformative, a fair use, and then it wasn't.  No wonder lawyers can make so much money.

Wednesday, April 7, 2021

I learned today that Less is More applied not only to the aesthetic realm, but to Verizon billing as well.  Madam and I decided to cancel our landline, although we recognized that we would be cut off from all those intense young men with South Asian accents purporting to be calling from Amazon, Apple, Social Security or Microsoft.  In exchange, we agreed to resume our patronage of Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi restaurants and even increase it once things return to near normal.

 

Through the marvels of modern telecommunications, it only took one hour on the telephone to learn that cancelling our Verizon landline would increase our monthly bill.  I suggested to the Customer Disservice Representative that this was akin to sending Little Johnny to the store to buy milk and cheese where it costs more than if he bought milk and cheese and butter.  My logic went nowhere; maybe the person on the other end was lactose intolerant.

Opposites Detract?

Monday, March 29, 2021

Law Professor David ably Zoomed us out of Egypt this weekend.  Many of my faithful readers know that Passover is special for me above and beyond its timeless story of the search for freedom.  Until homebound by the pandemic, we would attend at least one seder at the gracious home of Aunt Judi and Uncle Stu.  However, it was not the interior decoration that was the main attraction, liberation of the Jewish people aside. 

Aunt Judi's meals were legendary and I always tried to publicize her menus as soon as I crossed the Red Sea.  Now, for the second year, we have been denied our respective pleasures, mine gustatory, yours vicarious.  Next year in Englewood! 

. . .

The other day, a friend called my attention to a documentary movie clip wherein a federal law enforcement agent chuckled as he identified a case of arson as "Jewish lightning."  My friend was upset at this display of what he believed was anti-Semitism.  When I pursued his concern, I found that arson has been labelled as Greek lightning as well.  https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Greek%20Lightning

 

Possibly lessening the insult is the Cinnamon Honey Liqueur also named Greek Lightning.  https://store.passionspirits.com/greek-lightning.htm

This made me think about derisive labels in circulation.  We see the ugly consequences of the 45th president describing the current pandemic as the "China Flu."  Of course, "Spanish Flu" has remained the label of a previous deadly epidemic for a century, although its actual origin is unknown even to this day.  The first observations of illness and mortality were documented in Kansas in March 1918 and then in April in France, Germany and the United Kingdom.  However, I learned from Wikipedia that the label emerged when Spain's King Alfonso XIII became gravely ill.  Spain was neutral in WWI and had no wartime censorship restrictions, so his illness and subsequent recovery were reported to the world, while flu outbreaks in the belligerent countries were concealed. 

There may not have been malice in naming the Spanish Flu, but the labelling of syphilis has been weaponized over the centuries.  "The French called it the 'Neapolitan disease', or the 'Spanish disease', and also the 'great pox', the English and Italians called it the 'French disease', or the 'French pox', Germans called it the 'French evil', the Russians called it the 'Polish disease', the Polish and the Persians called it the 'Turkish disease'.  The Turkish called it the 'Christian disease', the Tahitians called it the 'British disease', in India it was called the 'Portuguese disease', in Japan it was called the 'Chinese pox'.”  https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/10/21/when-syphilis-first-surfaced-the-english-called-it-the-french-disease-they-werent-happy/

Of course, if you wish to avoid syphilis, you can use a French letter.  https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=french%20letter

We can add Dutch courage, French leave, driving while Asian, among other terms where the group identity is part of the insult. 

. . .

I just learned something -- Goodhart’s Law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”  In other words, when we set one specific goal, people will tend to optimize for that objective regardless of the consequences. 

https://towardsdatascience.com/unintended-consequences-and-goodharts-law-68d60a94705c

I may be one of many who internalized this as a manager or a teacher, but credit Goodhart for saying it out loud, a form of genius in itself.

Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Each week's copy of The New Yorker usually arrives on Tuesday.  However, I still can't figure out this cartoon from last week's issue.

 

After being stumped by it, I asked some others of penetrating intellect for help.  They got no further than I did.  Can someone out there enlighten us?  I thought of one possibility from my data processing days.  Lists of names, membership lists, telephone directories (remember them?), and the like, would have a few phony entries, which would be unknowingly reproduced in unauthorized copies claiming to be original works.  Maybe this cartoon is deliberately meaningless in order to trip up pontificating gas bags.

. . .

This morning, before going to the mailbox, I went to NYU Medical Center for a stress test, meant, I insist, to induce stress where none existed previously.  I was found to be an excellent example of an overweight, out of shape, over-the-hill individual.

Wednesday, March 31, 2021

My brother taught English literature for decades.  Although retired, he remains attentive to developments in the academic world.  He referred me to this exciting change.  "Montana Universities Prepare for Guns on Campuses."  https://www.chronicle.com/article/montana-universities-prepare-for-guns-on-campuses 

Won't office hours be fun?

. . .

Who is qualified to translate Amanda Gorman's poetry from English into a foreign language is a cultural controversy that landed on the front page of the New York Times.  

https://nyti.ms/3rz7RWh 

For some, the focus is not upon the résumé of the candidates, but their race or gender.  Does the work of this African-American woman, who soared to national attention at Biden's presidential inauguration, require or deserve to be translated abroad only by people of color?

If the issue centers on the underutilization of non-white translators generally, affirmative action is more than justified.  For example, a survey by the American Literary Translators Association found that only 2 percent of the 362 translators who responded were Black, which may represent lack of interest or lack of opportunity.

However, basing such hiring decisions on claims that the translator's identity should mirror Gorman's identity is provincial, at least, if not purely prejudicial.  How similar should they be?  Age?  Color?  Religion?  Upbringing?  Gender?  Education?  Sexuality?  Politics?  Birth order?

I found an interesting analog in an anecdote from a new biography of Philip Roth by Blake Bailey, repeated in the New York Times.  "At their first meeting in 2012, a job interview in effect, Roth was every part 'the imperious maestro,' Bailey recalls in the acknowledgments, examining the credentials of this 'gentile from Oklahoma' — what did he know about the Jewish American literary tradition?"  

 

Bailey satisfied Roth, a world-class curmudgeon from a modest, middle-class, Newark, Jewish family, and became his authorized biographer.  Of course, I recognize that there seems to be no shortage of Jewish biographers today, recounting the lives of Jews and Gentiles alike.  On the other hand, Roth was unlikely to be concerned about employment statistics. 

 

Friday, April 2, 2021

On our morning walk in 32° temperature, Stony Brook Steve and I tried to raise the heat by discussing the effort by Latinx activists to stop the naming of a Waukegan, Illinois public school after Barack and Michelle Obama, because of the former president's record on deportation.  https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/lake-county-news-sun/ct-lns-waukegan-school-board-st-0401-20210331-i7hg4fwhmbhaxbvcu3qqczvgqe-story.html

Steve wisely suggested resorting to the system that we grew up with, P.S. 33.  I offered the alternative, P.S. To Whom It May Concern.