The Weird Times
Inner Monologues and Desultory Reporting from Outer Spaces, Issue #156, May 7, 2023
There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way thru our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means 'My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.’—Isaac Asimov
The history of this country shows that the backlash is most extreme when people of color and Black people have accrued the most power. Redemption happens because of reconstruction. It is the accruement of power that warrants this kind of aggressive backlash.—Ta-Nehisi Coates
Books and Culture
The culture war’s latest casualty: The high school musical: Schools are canceling student shows with LGBTQ characters, Hannah Natanson, Washington Post, 5/2/23: “You see politicians and officials enacting rules and laws which are incredibly onerous and designed to enforce a very narrow view of what students can see, read, learn or act on stage.”
Resistance Pottery: Two recent exhibitions of the work of Black potters find political acts in the placid history of nineteenth-century American stoneware, Christopher Benfey, NY Review of Books, 5/11/2023 issue. You can listen to my 2017 Writerscast interview with Benfey about his book, Red Brick, Black Mountain, White Clay.
Library funding becomes the 'nuclear option' as the battle over books escalates, Tovia Smith, NPR, 5/4/23: "Any proposal to defund the library is the nuclear option," says Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom. "It's an attack on education, it's an attack on the public good. And the idea is very much alive and gaining steam."
Illinois lawmakers push back on library book bans, Claire Savage, APNews, 5/3/23: “Librarians are trained professionals, and we need to trust that they will stock our libraries with appropriate materials — they were hired for their expertise, and they deserve our respect.”
What Emojis Can’t Express: How Handwriting Reveals Our True Selves: Neil Serven Ponders the Lost Art of Penmanship, Neil Serven, LitHub, 5/1/23: “Left to express our agonies in a prefabricated, toothless font, we feel our personalities being held back.”
How Writers, Artists, and Creators Can Thrive in an AI World, Dan Blank, Creative Shift, 5/5/23: “As AI makes content creation even easier, even terrifyingly easy at times, human connection is the thing that will still be slow, deeply meaningful, and last through a myriad of changes and disruptions.”
Fitzgerald and the Writers’ Strike: F. Scott’s last creation is a warning to the picket line, Paul Greenberg, Medium, 4/28/23: “Writers can ride the merry-go-round of Hollywood “story development” only so many times before their perspective and will begin to crack.”
History Bright and Dark: Hillsdale College’s 1776 Curriculum and the documentary series based on the 1619 Project reflect deep divisions in how we recount our nation’s past, Adam Hochschild, NY Review of Books, 5/25/23 issue: “For all their thunder about how schools should not make us ashamed of our history, Republican politicians have said far less about what should be taught. But a fascinating, detailed picture of their dream educational agenda is there for the downloading from the website of Hillsdale College.”
The Renewed Importance of the Texas Gay Rodeo: As conservative politicians try to control expressions of gender and sexuality, a rural haven from hostility offers competition and comfort, Rachel Monroe, New Yorker, 4/30/23
The digital media bubble has burst. Where does the industry go from here? Buzzfeed, Vice, Gawker and Drudge Report are all traffic-war casualties, but they succeeded in shaking up the media landscape, Edward Hellmore, The Guardian, 5/7/23
Whenever I feel loss or lack, I imagine
The wind roaming outside of my childhood’s lair
—from “Poem” by Sandra Lim
Politicks and related (that) matters
Leonard Leo used Federalist Society contact to obtain $1.6B donation: The society’s close ties to Leo’s network raise questions about its nonpartisan, non-political status, Heidi Pryzbyla, Politico, 5/2/23
Clarence Thomas Had a Child in Private School. Harlan Crow Paid the Tuition: Crow paid for private school for a relative Thomas said he was raising “as a son.” “This is way outside the norm,” said a former White House ethics lawyer, Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott, Alex Majierski, ProPublica, 5/4/23
Emails Reveal ‘Jaw-Dropping’ Herschel Walker Money Scandal: Emails show Herschel Walker solicited hundreds of thousands of dollars for his own business from a billionaire donor, with the donor believing he was giving to Walker’s campaign, Roger Sollenberger, Daily Beast, 5/4/23
Judicial activist directed fees to Clarence Thomas’s wife, urged ‘no mention of Ginni:’ Leonard Leo told GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill nonprofit, then use money to pay spouse of Supreme Court justice, Emma Brown, Shawn Boburg, Jonathan O'Connell, Washington Post, 5/4/23
The Supreme Court’s Ethics Issues Are Not All Created Equal: But it’s the justices’ own fault that they’re all lumped together, Dahlia Lithwick, Mark Joseph Stern, Slate, 5/3/23 “The framers … wanted Congress to set rules for the Supreme Court, understanding that an entirely unelected institution needed checks put in place by a democratic branch.”
Ed.: As Dahlia Lithwick pointed out on MSNBC (May 4), we are not in the midst of an “ethics crisis” with the Supreme Court. What we need to recognize is that a very small number of right wing donors have designed the Supreme Court membership to suit their needs. We are in the midst of a crisis in democratic institutions being undermined by powerful interests that intend to overthrow democracy before it is too late to stop them.
Memo Reveals How Sandra Day O'Connor Helped Get George W. Bush to the White House: The right-wing justice sought to influence the opinions of others on the high court even before they heard arguments in Bush v. Gore, Brett Wilkins, Common Dreams, 5/3/23: "although we may never know with complete certainty the identity of the winner of this year's presidential election, the identity of the loser is perfectly clear. It is the nation's confidence in the judges as an impartial guardian of the rule of law." (Ed.: from Justice Stevens’ dissent to this truly terrible, history-changing decision).
Supreme Court move could spell doom for power of federal regulators: Conservatives get the chance to use a dispute over fisheries to deliver the final blow to Chevron deference, Josh Gerstein, Alex Guillen, Politico, 5/1/23: “A legal doctrine long despised by conservatives for giving federal regulators wide-ranging power is making yet another march to the gallows at the Supreme Court.” Ed.: This is yet another example of how the Supreme Court is being used to destroy democracy.
Fake Plaintiff, Fake Harm, Fake Case: The Supreme Court is poised to unwind a fair number of legal principles to make sure student debtors don’t get a break, David Dayen, American Prospect, 5/3/23
A Country Governed by Fear: How America became a violent society, Elizabeth Bruenig, The Atlantic, 5/4/23: “This is the country we have become.”
In the Post-Roe Era, Letting Pregnant Patients Get Sicker—by Design: Fearing legal repercussions, doctors in Texas say they are risking grave patient harm to comply with new abortion restrictions, Stephania Taladrid, New Yorker, 5/6/23
The Siege of Wounded Knee Was Not an End but a Beginning: Fifty years ago, the Oglala Sioux Civil Rights Organization invited the American Indian Movement to Pine Ridge and reignited a resistance that has never gone away, Benjamin Hedin, Nick Estes, New Yorker, 5/6/23
E. Jean Carroll’s Quest for Justice and the Carnage of Donald Trump’s Misogyny: The 79-year-old writer’s rape case shows what happens to a country that elects a president who so openly embraces degrading women, Molly Jong-Fast, Vanity Fair, 5/3/23: “There have been many moments in Carroll’s trial that tangibly laid bare why women don’t report sexual assault.”
Navajo Nation officials, activists feel cut out as company advances uranium mining plans, Hannah Grover, NM Political Report, 5/1/23 “The eastern Navajo Nation communities have stood largely in opposition to future uranium mining for decades.”
How Online Shopping Lost Touch With Reality: Consumers might think they have more control than ever, but they’re really just fumbling in the dark, Isabel Fattal, The Atlantic, 5/5/23: “Although being an informed consumer has always been challenging, it’s basically impossible in 2023.”
My 26-hour delay on Delta Air Lines, Mark Hurst, Creative Good, 5/5/23: “We need to fix the airlines, just like we need to fix Big Tech, just like we need to fix our financial system. We need to make them better.”
So, don't go to sleep, don't rest your head
I'll be the pillow, and I'll be the bed
Holding your dreams as you lie to rest
—from “Evangeline” by Stephen Sanchez
Science, Technology, and Environment
Seeking sanctuary on a warming planet: Scientists look to identify, map and preserve climate change refugia, Jonathan Thompson, High Country News, 5/1/23: “Preserving refugia alone won’t be enough; further warming must also be kept in check.”
Climate Change Threatens Insects — And Us: Researchers warn we risk losing a sustainable future if we don’t take action to conserve insects and address climate change. They also offer solutions, Tara Lohan, The Revelator, 4/14/23
EPA Report on Neonics Proves US Has 'Five-Alarm Fire' on Its Hands, Green Groups Say: "There's now no question that neonicotinoids play an outsized role in our heartbreaking extinction crisis," said one advocate. The EPA must "ban these pesticides so future generations don't live in a world without bees and butterflies and the plants that depend on them,” Kenny Stancil, Common Dreams, 5/5/23
Enigmatic human fossil jawbone may be evidence of an early Homo sapiens presence in Europe – and adds mystery about who those humans were, Brian Anthony Keeling, Rolf Quam, The Conversation, 5/2/23
Data-deficient species are a conservation blind spot. Geneticists found a way to see through it: They discovered that single animal’s DNA contains clues to the extinction risk of the entire species, Warren Cornwall, Anthropocene, 5/3/23: “The limited resources available for the conservation of wildlife species requires triage.”
The Oceans Are Missing Their Rivers: For billions of years, rivers connected continents to the sea. Then we came along, Erica Gies, Nautil.us, 5/3/23: “Dams are less climate-friendly and reliable than is widely believed.”
Do Hungry North Atlantic Right Whales Follow Their Noses? Whales seem to find food by sniffing for a chemical cue. Scientists are hoping to turn this into an early warning system to help save the imperiled species, Elizabeth Preston, Hakai, 5/4/23
Utah’s Suicide Pact With the Fossil Fuel Industry: The state’s fixation on oil and gas development threatens the Colorado River watershed, Stefanie Mencimer, Mother Jones, 5/4/23
Frustrated by Outdated Grids, Consumers Are Lobbying for Control of Their Electricity: Climate change is spurring interest in remaking local infrastructure to accommodate renewable energy, minimize power failures and expand consumer choice, Emma Foehringer Merchant, Inside Climate News, 5/5/23
Geoffrey Hinton tells us why he’s now scared of the tech he helped build: “I have suddenly switched my views on whether these things are going to be more intelligent than us,” Will Douglas Heaven, MIT Technology Review, 5/2/23: “Hinton wants to raise public awareness of the serious risks that he now believes may accompany the technology he ushered in.”
Environmentalists Want the FTC Green Guides to Slam the Door on the ‘Chemical’ Recycling of Plastic Waste: The plastics industry says heating and treating plastic waste with chemicals enables it to make new plastics. But environmentalists say that process, emitting large amounts of climate and air pollution, isn’t recycling and isn’t green, James Bruggers, Inside Climate News, 5/1/23
The dark universe: can a scientist battling long Covid unlock the mysteries of the cosmos? Since being laid low with the virus more than a year ago, Catherine Heymans can only operate in half-hour bursts. But her work could still change the way we understand the universe, Alex Blasdel, The Guardian, 5/2/23
A New Idea for How to Assemble Life: If we want to understand complex constructions, such as ourselves, assembly theory says we must account for the entire history of how such entities came to be, Philip Ball, Quanta, 5/4/23: “complex molecules can’t just emerge into existence, because the combinatorial space is too vast.”
The spirit of the Rillito: ‘New animism’ seeks a connection to nature’s pulse, Ruxandra Guidi, High Country news, 5/1/23: “Witnessing anthropogenic change and recognizing my own role in it has been crushingly disorienting and sad; I find myself searching for the kind of guidance my grandmothers or great-grandmothers would have given me had we had more time together.”
Health and Wellness
Seasonal Allergies Are Coming for Us All: Climate change is pumping the air with pollen, and it’s a problem even for people who don’t think they’re allergic, Yasmin Tayag, Atlantic, 5/3/23
Disease experts warn White House of potential for omicron-like wave of illness, Dan Diamond, Washington Post, 5/5/23
The Long Covid Mystery Has a New Suspect: Immune cells called monocytes are triggered to help clear infection—but in some cases they never switch off, leaving patients breathless for months, Maggie Chen, Wired, 5/5/23
Why viral reservoirs are a prime suspect for long COVID sleuths, Will Stone, NPR, 5/2/23: “…It's possible the "genetic backbone" of the virus is producing viral proteins in certain tissues — the most likely sites being the gut, lungs and nerves — which then spill into the bloodstream.”
Is Covid really over? WHO’s announcement sounds more like surrender than victory: Although the acute phase of the pandemic may have passed, experts agree that the virus’s effects will remain profound, Robin McKie, The Guardian, 5/7/23
Climate change is changing public health: In Washington, a new team of epidemiologists is preparing for a hotter, smokier future, Kylie Mohr, High Country News, 5/1/23
Well, I've tried to open up my window and let the light come in
I step outside in the middle of the morning and in the evening again
Yes, I've tried to be grateful for my devils and call them by their names
But I'm tired and by the middle of the morning I need someone to blame
—from “Middle of the Morning,” Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit (written by Jason Isbell)
Birdland
How woodpeckers can be used to aid in wildfire recovery: Pyrodiversity involves the interactions of fire, biodiversity and ecosystem, Julia Jacobo, ABC News, 5/2/23 “Black-backed woodpeckers "love pyrodiversity," or variation in the way that fires burn, which results in uneven patches burned at high, medium, and low severity.”
The greatest bird artist you’ve never heard of: Rex Brasher painted more birds than Audubon, and he never owned slaves, Phillip Kennicott, Washington Post, 4/29/23
Wildflowers, eagles and Native history: can this California ridge be protected? Described as a ‘botanical wonderland’, the rocky ridge is home to more than 30 species of rare plants and Indigenous village sites, Maanvi Singh, The Guardian, 4/30/23
A massive and likely unprecedented ornithological event, Mark Faherty, WCAI, 5/2/23: “Phalaropes are delightful oddities in several ways. They’re not rare, but people almost never see them.”
the air a kind of thinking like everybody else
looking for a continuing contravention of limits and
of substance
—from “A Bird in the House,” Robin Blaser
Recommended reading
Poets on the Road, Maureen Owen, Barbara Henning, City Point Press (due out 6/6/23)
The Holy Forest: Collected Poems of Robin Blaser, Univ of California Press
This is the 156th issue of The Weird Times, marking three full years of its weekly circulation. I’m kind of surprised by this fact. I don’t think I’ve ever done anything this consistently for this long. Admittedly, in the greater scheme of things, three years is not that much time. But looking back, it seems like some time has passed. I started doing this because of the pandemic, and even though it’s been declared officially over, I will keep on doing this for awhile longer, because there’s so much that’s worth paying attention to.
My deepest thanks to all of you for continuing to ride along with me on this journey through time and space. I’m gratified to have your support, and appreciate hearing from so many of you along the way. I know there’s way too much information here most of the time, but my hope remains that there’s something here for almost anyone to discover, learn from, and sometimes even act on. If only one story, song lyric or quote in any given week catches your attention and moves you in some way, that makes the entire effort worthwhile.
Wishing you all much love, looking forward to next week and beyond — and hoping always that we can make positive change, find hope, and share our love as wide and far as possible. Keep in touch—David