2:00PM Water Cooler 11/11/2024 | bare capitalism

Date:


By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Extra barrages from the Blame Cannons shortly! –lambert

Chook Tune of the Day

Northern Mockingbird, Fountain Creek–S Circle Dr to S Academy Blvd, El Paso, Colorado, United States. With barking canine. Not less than I suppose that’s not “mockery.”

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In Case You May Miss…

  1. First head rolls at Boeing, breakup rumors.
  2. Angus Deaon on economics and economists.
  3. Sentinel intelligence.

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Search for the Helpers

I don’t know if that is “serving to” per se, but it surely’s actually candy:

Additionally, the creativity goes little one → tech, not tech → little one. Because it ought to.

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My e mail handle is down by the plant; please ship examples of there (“Helpers” within the topic line). In our more and more determined and fragile neoliberal society, on a regular basis regular incidents and tales of “the communism of on a regular basis life” are what I’m on the lookout for (and never, say, the Crimson Cross in Hawaii, and even the UNWRA in Gaza).

Politics

“So lots of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in reality a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles

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Trump Transition

“Home Quick-Tracks Invoice That Would Give Trump Energy to Goal Nonprofits” [Rolling Stone]. “The Home is about to vote this week on a invoice that will grant the Treasury Division authority to revoke tax-exempt standing from any nonprofit it declares to be a ‘terrorist-supporting group,’ giving the company broad latitude to find out what meaning. The laws, the Cease Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act (H.R. 9495), was initially drafted to stop the IRS from issuing fines and tax penalties to Individuals held hostage by worldwide terrorist teams in addition to residents unjustly incarcerated overseas. By placing these two measures collectively beneath one invoice, Republicans try to make it harder to oppose. ‘They hooked up it to a brilliant standard invoice that everybody likes as a result of they wish to make it arduous for folks to vote ‘no,” Kia Hamadanchy, senior coverage counsel on the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), informed The Intercept. ‘The fact is that in the event that they actually needed the hostage factor to change into regulation, they’d go that by itself.’ Hamadanchy mentioned that this invoice is ‘about stifling dissent and to sit back advocacy, as a result of individuals are going to keep away from sure issues and take sure positions in an effort to keep away from this designation.’ The invoice would permit the Treasury secretary to inform focused nonprofits that their tax-exempt standing is in danger, giving the group 90 days to attraction earlier than shedding its 501(c)(3) standing. The imprecise language within the invoice might be used in opposition to nonprofits that help Palestinian rights, reproductive rights, and environmental protections.” • After I lastly found that NGOs had been the entity chargeable for inserting migrants in, e.g., Springfield, OH, and that the method was completely opaque, it grew to become apparent to me that the NGOs had been driving for a fall (identical to the NGOs in, say, Georgia), being as they’re an unlimited and unelected half — if blobby entities may be mentioned to have elements — of the Democrat Celebration (the place in addition they function an infinite sink to suck down vitality and personnel from the (a) left, correctly conceived. And it might certain be good the Republicans didn’t act like Democrats and amp up the “terrorism” foofra. Simply write and go the invoice by itself deserves.

Democrats en Déshabillé

“Who will lead Democrats in 2028? Meet the leaders positioning themselves to make strikes” [Politico]. Ah, “rising stars.” “As she watched Shapiro glad-hand in a Harmony bookshop one late October morning after stumping for Democratic gubernatorial nominee Joyce Craig, native Democratic activist Maura Prepared marveled in regards to the get together’s deep bench.” Josh Shapiro, Gavin Newsom, Andy Beshear, JB Pritzker, Pete Buttigieg, Gretchen Whitmer, John Fetterman, Wes Moore, Ro Khanna, Tim Walz (no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, in all probability not; I believe Walz acquired a uncooked deal from Kamala’s goons).

Syndemics

“I’m in earnest — I cannot equivocate — I cannot excuse — I cannot retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

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Covid Sources, United States (Nationwide): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; consists of many counties; Wastewater Scan, consists of drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, however nationwide knowledge). “An infection Management, Emergency Administration, Security, and Common Ideas” (particularly on hospitalization by metropolis).

Lambert right here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To replace any entry, do be at liberty to contact me on the handle given with the vegetation. Please put “COVID” within the topic line. Thanks!

Sources, United States (Native): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater stories); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).

Sources, Canada (Nationwide): Wastewater (Authorities of Canada).

Sources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).

Hat tricks to useful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, sq. coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).

Keep protected on the market!

Airborne Transmission: Covid

“I’ve had a realisation about one of many sliding doorways moments within the pandemic” [@1goodtern, Threadreader]. That is actually glorious and price studying in full. “I had a chat with a advisor anaesthetist a few months in the past when he requested me why I wore an ffp3 masks, and a few issues he mentioned in reply didn’t make sense. His phrases had been bouncing spherical behind my head all this time, then I noticed one thing immediately that made full sense of them. He had been speaking in regards to the distinction between droplets and aerosols and the way he had had coaching and briefings at which he had seen research that had *confirmed* that almost all transmission in healthcare settings was *at shut vary*… Based mostly on that, he thought that surgical masks (‘fluid resistant/repellant surgical masks’, frsm) had been satisfactory to cease transmission. In his thoughts, ‘shut vary’ and ‘quick vary’ meant *droplets*.” • However “shut vary” means aerosols, too! (Ask your self the place the scent of cigarette smoke is strongest; close to the smoker, in fact, at shut vary. However the scent doesn’t come from droplets.) I didn’t get the physics of it early on myself, and I’m guessing I’m not alone. The thread can also be very a lot value studying for the tradition of medical professionals.

Transmission: Covid

Dangerous information from California:

Not what CDC says, although the timing might be completely different.

Transmission: H5N1

Extra dangerous information from California:

Vaccines: Covid

“Girl Fired For Refusing Covid Vaccine Wins File $12 Million” [Newsweek]. “federal jury in Detroit awarded greater than $12 million Friday to a former Blue Cross Blue Defend of Michigan (BCBSM) worker who was terminated after declining to get a COVID-19 vaccination, citing spiritual discrimination.” • I’m so sick of privileging the spiritual in discrimination and “conscience clause” instances when it’s actually all politics. You’ll be able to guess that if anyone cited “Christian values” once they introduced a case earlier than the NLRB they’d be laughed at and shot down (although there’s loads of Catholic thought in that space). In any case, public well being solely and as standard acquired it 180° incorrect, as I’ve muttered on a number of events. We must always by no means have mandated vaccines, and we ought to have mandated non-pharmaceutical interventions. And so public well being managed to destroy the credibility of each, good job.

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TABLE 1: Every day Covid Charts

Wastewater
This week[1] CDC November 4 Final Week[2] CDC (till subsequent week):

Variants [3] CDC November 9 Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC November 2

Hospitalization
New York[5] New York State, knowledge November 7: Nationwide [6] CDC November 8:

Positivity
Nationwide[7] Walgreens November 11: Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic November 2:

Vacationers Knowledge
Positivity[9] CDC October 21: Variants[10] CDC October 21:

Deaths
Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC November 2: Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC November 2:

LEGEND

1) for charts new immediately; all others usually are not up to date.

2) For a full-size/full-resolution picture, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Home windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open picture in new tab.”

NOTES

[1] (CDC) Excellent news!

[2] (CDC) Final week’s wastewater map.

[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* nonetheless standard. XEC has entered the chat. That WHO label, “Ommicron,” has executed an excellent job normalizing successive waves of an infection.

[4] (ED) Down.

[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Steadily down.

[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). Truly improved; it’s now one of many few charts to point out your entire course of the pandemic to the current day.

[7] (Walgreens) Down.

[8] (Cleveland) Down.

[9] (Vacationers: Positivity) Down.

[10] (Vacationers: Variants). Now XEC.

[11] Deaths low, positivity down.

[12] Deaths low, ED down.

Stats Watch

Sentiment: “United States NFIB Enterprise Optimism Index” [Trading Economics]. “The NFIB Small Enterprise Optimism Index within the US elevated to 91.5 in September 2024 from 91.2 in August, lacking forecasts of 91.7. This was the thirty third consecutive month under the 50-year common of 98.”

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Manufacturing: “Boeing Exhibits Why Squeezing Employees Is Reckless” [Boeing]. “A stunning share of full-time staff don’t earn sufficient to lift a household, and that was true even earlier than the latest spike in inflation made all the things much more costly. As a lot as two-thirds of full-time staff age 25 and older can’t cowl the essential requirements for a household of 4 with one guardian working, in keeping with wage knowledge from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and dwelling wage estimates from the Massachusetts Institute of Expertise. It’s this actuality that has injected recent vigor into labor motion lately. Unions have scored first-time organizing wins at firms throughout industries together with at Starbucks Corp., Apple Inc., Wells Fargo & Co. and Amazon.com Inc., whereas picketing staff have received report pay will increase in some instances. Boeing’s is the most recent victory, and count on extra to comply with as extra staff refuse to point out up for work that doesn’t permit them to pay the payments. Within the Seattle space, the place Boeing produces most of its plane, a dwelling wage is roughly $50 an hour for a household of 4 with one grownup working, in keeping with MIT’s dwelling wage calculator, or about $104,000 a 12 months based mostly on a 40-hour work week. It’s in all probability no coincidence then that Boeing’s labor deal will elevate the typical machinist’s annual wage to $119,000 over 4 years. Assuming 3% annual inflation, a dwelling wage for a household of 4 will likely be nearer to $117,000 in 4 years, very almost matching what Boeing’s staff agreed to.

The substantial wage enhance reveals the diploma to which Boeing’s staff fall wanting a dwelling wage. It’s a harsh reality that Boeing might simply disguise from buyers as a result of public firms — even the largest, most significant amongst them — usually are not required to reveal how a lot they pay staff, a gap of their monetary statements that regulators ought to plug.” • Hmm. Social copy idea?

Manufacturing: “Boeing’s head of high quality for industrial planes, Elizabeth Lund, is retiring” [Seattle Times]. “Elizabeth Lund, senior vp of high quality at Boeing Industrial Airplanes and one of many firm’s most outstanding feminine executives, will retire subsequent month, the corporate mentioned Monday… Lund had risen over a protracted profession to senior vp and normal supervisor of all airplane packages. A month after the fuselage blowout on Alaska Airways Flight 1282 in January, Lund was given the duty of main the standard group and arising with a plan to revive the boldness of each the general public and the Federal Aviation Administration in Boeing’s administration of its product high quality. Nevertheless in June, Lund was rebuked by the Nationwide Transportation Security Board for breaking strict disclosure guidelines about ongoing accident investigations when she publicly commented on particulars about how the Alaska Airways incident had occurred. In consequence, Boeing’s entry to the NTSB’s investigative data on the incident was withdrawn.” • Oopsie.

Manufacturing: “The place Will Boeing Be In 3 Years?” [The Motley Fool]. “Over the past 12 months, Boeing’s web loss totals $8 billion — its worst loss ever for the reason that first 12 months of the pandemic. Admittedly, an enormous chunk of Boeing’s loss is attributable to a one-time occasion, the corporate’s fourth-longest-ever labor strike, which contributed about $4 billion to losses in Q3.” • I don’t play the ponies, or learn stability sheets (any extra), however the price of the brand new machinist’s contract over 4 years appears like ~$1.5 billion. So Boeing spent $4 billion (and raised one other $25 billion or so in inventory and debt) to save lots of $1.5 billion. Make it make sense.

Manufacturing: “Fixing Boeing Might Imply Breaking It Up” [Barron’s]. “‘Breaking up Boeing’s divisions….might be a calculated motion to launch latent worth and provides stockholders a clearer street towards long-term success,’ wrote The Edge founder Jim Osman in a Sunday article for Forbes…. Industrial airplanes and protection aren’t worthwhile segments at present. The companies phase has continued to generate income regardless of Boeing’s latest issues, which embody poor high quality, decrease manufacturing, and value inflation…. ‘Separating these divisions would allow Boeing to let each division deal with assets and management extra exactly towards its targets,’ added Osman, who owns Boeing inventory. , so this may provide a extra open view of Boeing’s operations and worth and assist to rebuild it.’” • Ah, “confidence.”

Tech: Good query:

Attainable reply:

Is sensible as a result of actual books are simpler and extra pleasurable to learn than digital ones (and extra memorable). Additionally, Google needs to maintain folks ignorant, as does Silicon Valley typically.

* * *

At this time’s Worry & Greed Index: 68 Greed (earlier shut: 60 Greed) [CNN]. One week in the past: 41 (Worry). (0 is Excessive Worry; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Nov 11 at 2:15:59 PM ET.

Rapture Index: Closes unchanged [Rapture Ready]. File Excessive, October 10, 2016: 189. Present: 182. (Keep in mind that bringing on the Rapture is nice.) • Onerous to consider the Rapture Index goes down. Do these folks know one thing we don’t?

Gallery

Snow, sigh:

Zeitgeist Watch

“You’re Not a Fearmonger. You Have Sentinel Intelligence” [Jessica, The Sentinel Intelligence]. “Sentinel intelligence refers to a particular cognitive skill that permits somebody to detect threats earlier than anybody else. Richard A. Clarke and R.P. Eddy speak about this trait of their e-book, Warnings: Discovering Cassandras to Cease Catastrophes. They evaluation a lot of pure and financial disasters all through historical past. As they write, ‘in every occasion a Cassandra was pounding the desk and warning us exactly in regards to the disasters that got here as promised.’ Not solely had been they ignored, however ‘the folks with the ability to reply usually put extra effort into discounting the Cassandra than saving lives and assets.’ It simply retains occurring. When you’ve got sentinel intelligence, your mind can mixture and sift via extraordinary quantities of knowledge in a really quick time frame, particularly in terms of seeing latent or hidden risks. You don’t get stymied by what Clarke and Eddy name the ‘magnitude of overload.’ In some methods, it’s a superpower. Analysis on delicate people confirms how sentinels and Cassandras suppose. Social psychologist Tsachi Ein-Dor writes that a few of us ‘are chronically hypervigilant and always alert to potential threats and risks. Different people, as soon as alerted to a menace, are self-reliant and more likely to take protecting actions quickly and successfully.’ In different phrases, we’re hardwired alarm methods. Teams usually tend to survive once they have a mixture of people who find themselves expert at detecting, speaking, and performing on threats to their survival. A few of us can establish threats simply by realizing that one thing’s off. One examine in Nature Scientific Studies describes this skill as scene gist. As they clarify, ‘Scene gist extracted quickly from the atmosphere might assist folks detect threats.’ The shapes and contours of a panorama can set off our menace brains even earlier than we all know the main points of what we’re taking a look at.” • “Scene gist,” hmm.

“11.0- Welcome to the Martian Revolution” (podcast) [Mike Duncan, Revolutions]. • Mike Duncan has returned!

Musical Interlude

Sound sytems — vans stacked with audio system and an influence supply — are ubiquitous outdoors the West. You would possibly consider them as musical technicals:

“Steel Field” was nice, however (and) spherical:

That is sq.. (“Haile Unlikely” might be the very best Rastafarian-adjacent song-title ever.)

Guillotine Watch

“Extremely-wealthy Democrats race to purchase London boltholes after Trump win” [The Telegraph]. “Becky Fatemi, government accomplice at Sotheby’s Worldwide Realty, mentioned she obtained 5 calls in two days from rich Individuals who wish to transfer as an instantaneous response to the US election end result… ‘That’s folks saying, ‘he’s right here, and he’s right here for the following 4 years, and I don’t wish to be, so these are the dates that we’re flying over’. All of these 5 are coming right here throughout the subsequent week,’ Ms Fatemi mentioned…. Prior to now two months, enquiries to her staff from American patrons trying within the UK have jumped by 30pc 12 months on 12 months, Ms Fatemi mentioned.” • Good riddance, say I. And it’s amusing to think about ultra-wealthy Democrats squabbling with corrupt Ukrainians for London property, although I think about the middlemen will make out nice, as standard.

Class Warfare

“Rethinking My Economics” [Angus Deaton, International Monetary Fund]. From March, and first talked about by alert reader Turtle. ” Economics Nobel Prize winners have been identified to denounce one another’s work on the ceremonies in Stockholm, a lot to the consternation of these laureates within the sciences who consider that prizes are given for getting issues proper.” Ouch! And: “[Mainstream] economists, who’ve prospered mightily over the previous half century, would possibly pretty be accused of getting a vested curiosity in capitalism because it at present operates.” Extra: “With out an evaluation of energy, it’s arduous to know inequality or a lot else in fashionable capitalism.” Extra: “[W]e have largely stopped eager about ethics and about what constitutes human well-being.” And: “[A] concern with distribution was overruled by consideration to the typical, usually nonsensically described because the “nationwide curiosity.’” And: “Historians, who perceive about contingency and about a number of and multidirectional causality, usually do a greater job than economists of figuring out vital mechanisms which are believable, fascinating, and price eager about.” • Price studying in full.

Information of the Wired

“The massed-spaced studying impact in non-neural human cells” [Nature]. From the Summary: “The massed-spaced impact is a trademark characteristic of reminiscence formation. We now exhibit this impact in two separate non-neural, immortalized cell traces… . .” Commentary is wild:


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Contact data for vegetation: Readers, be at liberty to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) learn the way to ship me a examine if you’re allergic to PayPal and (b) to learn the way to ship me photographs of vegetation. Greens are wonderful! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary vegetation! If you would like your deal with to seem as a credit score, please place it initially of your mail in parentheses: (thus). In any other case, I’ll anonymize by utilizing your initials. See the earlier Water Cooler (with plant) right here. From JB:

JB writes: “Conks of Phellinus fungus proliferating on a lifeless tree . . . life persists!”

Additionally, life persists otherwise; in the course of the election protection, I had steered that readers would possibly wish to ship in footage of consolation meals. Alert reader Petal did:

Petal wrote: “Macaroni and cheese (with ham) from scratch.” And it appears nearly as good now because it did then!

Variety readers, my queue for plant photographs is rising a bit quick, and that all the time makes me queasy. Do you could have an photographs to ship in, particularly of autumn produce or winter tasks? Thanks!

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This entry was posted in Water Cooler on by Lambert Strether.

About Lambert Strether

Readers, I’ve had a correspondent characterize my views as practical cynical. Let me briefly clarify them. I consider in common packages that present concrete materials advantages, particularly to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime instance, however tuition-free faculty and a Put up Workplace Financial institution additionally fall beneath this heading. So do a Jobs Assure and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can ship on such packages, as a result of the 2 are completely different flavors of neoliberalism (“As a result of markets”). I don’t a lot care in regards to the “ism” that delivers the advantages, though whichever one does should put frequent humanity first, versus markets. May very well be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t a lot care, so long as the advantages are delivered.

To me, the important thing situation — and that is why Medicare for All is all the time first with me — is the tens of 1000’s of extra “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton examine, and different latest research. That giant physique rely makes Medicare for All, on the very least, an ethical and strategic crucial. And that degree of struggling and natural injury makes the considerations of id politics — even the worthy combat to assist the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — shiny shiny objects by comparability. Therefore my frustration with the information circulation — at present for my part the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the opposite by out-of-power liberals and their allies within the State and within the press — a information circulation that always forces me to deal with issues that I regard as of secondary significance to the surplus deaths. What sort of political economic system is it that halts and even reverses the will increase in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I’m additionally very hopeful that the persevering with destruction of each get together institutions will open the area for voices supporting packages just like these I’ve listed; let’s name such voices “the left.” Volatility creates alternative, particularly if the Democrat institution, which places markets first and opposes all such packages, isn’t allowed to get again into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I like the tactical degree, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been running a blog about it every day for fourteen years, however all the things I write has this angle in the back of it.













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