The Ledes

Thursday, September 19, 2024

New York Times: “A body believed to be of the suspect in a Kentucky highway shooting that left five people seriously injured this month was found on Wednesday, the authorities said, ending a manhunt that stretched into a second week and set the local community on edge. The Kentucky State Police commissioner, Phillip Burnett Jr., said in a Wednesday night news conference that at approximately 3:30 p.m., two troopers and two civilians found an unidentified body in the brush behind the highway exit where the shooting occurred.... The police have identified the suspect of the shooting as Joseph A. Couch, 32. They said that on Sept. 7, Mr. Couch perched on a cliff overlooking Interstate 75 about eight miles north of London, Ky., and opened fire. One of the wounded was shot in the face, and another was shot in the chest. A dozen vehicles were riddled with gunfire.”

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The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

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Thursday
Sep022010

It's the Economy, Stupid

Tonight I'm not going to wait for the Times trolls to reject or bury my comments. (See update below.*) Here's a two-fer:


Paul Krugman hopes that President Obama, who is scheduled to propose new economic measures next week, will come up with bold initiatives.

The Constant Weader hopes so, too, but is a realist. BTW, this is an unexpurgated version of my comment. The original was more circumspect in describing Rahm Emanuel's remark:

... politics determines who has the power, not who has the truth.
-- Paul Krugman

               ... My nomination for your Bartlett's entry.

As for President Obama's doing anything bold next week, it's unlikely. Pundits love comparing Presidents: Obama is like/not enough like FDR; he's like Carter; or the theme du jour, he's like Hoover. I'd say he's more like the husband of his primary opponent. If you recall, President Clinton started out bold: for example, eliminate discrimination against gays in the military, balance the out-of-control budget. This was followed by never mind & school uniforms. I'm afraid with Mr. Obama, we're in school uniform territory.

Here's some evidence:

The President's Deficit Commission, larded with old geezers like Alan Simpson, who likens Social Security to "a milk cow with 310 million tits!" (exclamation Simpson's) President Obama knew what he was getting when he chose the members of the commission; I am not alone in thinking the Deficit Commission is an excuse for cutting Social Security benefits.

Meanwhile, McClatchy ran a story today that says Republicans, ConservaDems & other Democrats in tight races are poised to ensure that tax cuts for the rich will be extended. Somebody has to pay for those new yachts the super-rich will be buying with their tax savings -- might as well be old folks who are no longer economically productive.

As for the Administration's interest in jobs, jobs, jobs, car czar Steve Rattner's new book provides a window into how much the Obama Administration cared about labor. Rahm Emanuel's comment about the United Auto Workers: "Fuck the UAW." And Robert Gibbs let us know what the White House thought about progressive proposals: those of us who espouse them should be drug-tested. Michael Scherer writes a long article in Time about how profoundly disappointed the jobless are in Obama -- he has not kept his campaign promises and folks are still out of work. Tim Geithner and other Administration leaders are pretty sanguine about this.

Christina Romer, who is giving up her job as head of Obama's Council of Economic Advisers, supposedly to help her son with his homework, gave a "valedictory" speech at the National Press Club this week in which she pretty much admitted she had no idea how to improve the economy. (Good luck with your homework, Master Romer.) "To this day," she claimed, "economists don't fully understand why firms cut production as much as they did or why they cut labor so much more than they normally would." She argued that "almost all analysts were surprised." 

As for measures to stem foreclosures & otherwise save the housing market, the Administration is completely clueless. Secretary Donovan says he's "concerned," but that doesn't stop him from boasting about the few foreclosures the Administration has averted.

The editors of the New York Times wrote last week that if President Obama had some good ideas to salvage the economy, this would be the time to announce them. But the truth is that Republicans & ConservaDems would block any bold initiatives, so all President Obama can do, and sadly all he is inclined to do, is propose a few conservative business incentives -- you know, something as innovative & effective as school uniforms. In other words, he will be following Romer's bromide even as she exits:

What we would all love to find -- the inexpensive magic bullet to our economic troubles -- the truth is it almost surely doesn't exist.


Meanwhile, across the op-ed page, David Brooks has completely lost touch with reality. (Okay, Brooks' mental breakdown may have happened some while back, & his recent vacation didn't help matters.) He invents a preposterous scenario, or what he calls an "alternate history," in which the President & the Congress take Brooks' advice. They forget about the stimulus & healthcare reform & pass some kind of Republicanny energy bill instead. Oh, and everything works out for the best & the nation hums happily along.

The Constant Weader comments:

Add this to your alternate history, please, for a touch of verisimilitude:

U.S. unemployment at 16 percent, same as Ireland's. Real wages plummet for Americans who do have jobs.

Small businesses go under at record rates. Start-ups, practically nil.

Healthcare costs skyrocket; emergency rooms crammed; uninsured, unemployed Americans dying in droves.

No Glenn Beck tent revival because the Washington Mall is already filled with a tent city & a stench is rising from the Potomac.

Republican Senators block the energy bill.

I ought to have added:

Teachers, other public workers are laid off in droves.

Local property taxes rise sharply; delinquencies double; sheriffs conduct record number of home auctions.

California is the first state to declare bankruptcy, thirteen other states are expected to follow soon.

Bridge over the (Pick-a) River collapses, dozens feared dead; engineers say bridge was in terrible disrepair. Chunks of concrete from I-4 off-ramp fall on car, occupants killed. Et-cetera.

Finally,

The super-rich build higher fences around their homes & spend more time on their bigger & better yachts -- hey, they can afford it.


* Update: they cut only my comment on Krugman, which was the substantive one.

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