The people who count and those who don't

Here we are spending a season on Martha's Vineyard island off Massachusetts and the question inevitably arises as we see old friends: "how's Alan Dershowitz holding up?" This is a small place, especially in winter, and our decidedly not-oligarchic-class friends regularly encounter the famous TV-lawyer and defender of the likes of OJ Simpson and his more recent buddy, Jeffrey Epstein.

Dershowitz is infamous around here for being angry that his chummy attachments to such criminals make him an Undesirable himself. He rages at social exclusion. He's been known to get into a loud public beef at the summer farmer's market, for example. 

Anand Giridharadas' oped, How the Elite Behave When No One Is Watching: Inside the Epstein Emails [gift link] seems to me both insightful and incisive about why elites and their hangers-on like Dershowitz feel injured when called to account. On this island, the rest of us get a close up glimpse on occasion, especially of the ones who are Democrats. A lot of people know what they are seeing; this place is full of smart New Englanders. (And yes, still feel they have to look to Democrats for something better.)

... People are right to sense that, as the [so far released Epstein] emails lay bare, there is a highly private merito-aristocracy at the intersection of government and business, lobbying, philanthropy, start-ups, academia, science, high finance and media that all too often takes care of its own more than the common good. They are right to resent that there are infinite second chances for members of this group even as so many Americans are deprived of first chances. They are right that their pleas often go unheard, whether they are being evicted, gouged, foreclosed on, A.I.-obsolesced — or, yes, raped. 

... The emails, in my view, together sketch a devastating epistolary portrait of how our social order functions, and for whom. Saying that isn’t extreme. The way this elite operates is.

The idea of an Epstein class is helpful because one can be misled by the range of people to whom Mr. Epstein ingratiated himself. Republicans. Democrats. Businesspeople. Diplomats. Philanthropists. Healers. Professors. Royals. Superlawyers. A person he emailed at one moment was often at war with the ideas of another correspondent — a Lawrence Summers to a Steve Bannon, a Deepak Chopra to a scientist skeptical of all spirituality, a Peter Thiel to a Noam Chomsky. This diversity masked a deeper solidarity.

... If this neoliberal-era power elite remains poorly understood, it may be because it is not just a financial elite or an educated elite, a noblesse-oblige elite, a political elite or a narrative-making elite; it straddles all of these, lucratively and persuaded of its own good intentions. If it’s a jet set, it’s a carbon-offset-private-jet set. After all, flying commercial won’t get you from your Davos breakfast on empowering African girls with credit cards to your crypto-for-good dinner in Aspen. ...

Many of the Epstein emails begin with a seemingly banal rite that, the more I read, took on greater meaning: the whereabouts update and inquiry. In the Epstein class, emails often begin and end with pings of echolocation. “Just got to New York — love to meet, brainstorm,” the banker Robert Kuhn wrote to Mr. Epstein. “i’m in wed, fri. edelman?” Mr. Epstein wrote to the billionaire Thomas Pritzker (it is unclear if he meant a person, corporation or convening). To Lawrence Krauss, a physicist in Arizona: “noam is going to tucson on the 7th. will you be around.” Mr. Chopra wrote to say he would be in New York, first speaking, then going “for silence.” Gino Yu, a game developer, announced travel plans involving Tulum, Davos and the D.L.D. (Digital Life Design) conference — an Epstein-class hat trick.

Landings and takeoffs, comings and goings, speaking engagements and silent retreats — members of this group relentlessly track one another’s passages through J.F.K., L.H.R., N.R.T. and airports you’ve never even heard of. Whereabouts are the pheromones of this elite. ...

Giridharadas is brutal, revealing the moral emptiness of the Epstein class. 

...the emails depict a group whose highest commitment is to their own permanence in the class that decides things. When principles conflict with staying in the network, the network wins. ... These are permanent survivors who will profit when things are going this way and then profit again when they turn. ... 

Generally, you can’t read other people’s emails. Powerful people have private servers, I.T. staffs, lawyers. When you get a rare glimpse into how they actually think and view the world, what they actually are after, heed Maya Angelou: Believe them.

American democracy today is in a dangerous place. The Epstein emails are a kind of prequel to the present. This is what these powerful people, in this mesh of institutions and communities, were thinking and doing — taking care of one another instead of the general welfare — before it got really bad.

This era has seen a surge in belief in conspiracy theories, including about Mr. Epstein, because of an underlying intuition people have that is, in fact, correct: The country often seems to be run not for the benefit of most of us. ...

Jeffrey Epstein's immediate victims are not alone in being treated like disposable trash by this set. We all are.

Posting may (or may not) be sporadic over Thanksgiving week as family assembles. I expect further outrages in this time when many look away. 

Fraught times

This is not a good year for a Sunday celebrating "Christ the King." We are -- properly -- in a No Kings mode these days in the corner of the US populace I live in. 

The Christian liturgical observance is actually quite modern -- and came along in response to threats to human life and dignity in Europe only one century ago.

Originally, Pope Pius XI instituted the feast as a direct counter to the totalitarian claims of the modern state. The immediate threat in 1925 was, of course, communism on one hand, and the looming threat of fascism on the other. In more general terms, the annual celebration of this feast with its particular focus on the lordship as well as the universal and eternal scope of Christ’s reign was promulgated to stand as a witness over against any and all secularizing tendencies of the contemporary world.

... All worldly claims to ultimate loyalties are rendered relative. For Christians, reflecting on this is part and parcel of taking stock, both personally and as a community, at the inception of a new [liturgical] year. -- What Are We Waiting For?: Re-Imaging Advent for Time to Come by William H. Peterse

Okay -- American Christians and non-Christians alike are being reminded of the need to use the good brains we are born with to discern how to live, thrive, and resist under the rule of a monarchical pretender. 

As one liturgical cycle ends and another begins, let's keep up the good work of justice and compassion and remember that no false king can claim to determine for us how we ought to live.

I am thankful for our rising rage ...

As we come into the Thanksgiving season, I realize that I am heartened by growing rage against the offenses against our country by the Trump regime and oligarchy. These are too many to catalog. The list here is necessarily short and incomplete, but plenty infuriating.

• a deportation dragnet which empowers masked thugs to abduct harmless persons within our country for the crime of speaking another language or having brown skin;

• a plan to turn over our coastlines to oil drillers to pollute; 

• the attempted surrender of the sovereign state of Ukraine to Vladimir Putin. (Europe might yet step up; Ukrainians have no choice but to resist. I remain convinced the proper historical analogy is the democracies' betrayal of the Spanish Republic to the fascists in the 1930; the resulting regime of terror lasted 50 years in unhappy Spain.)

• Trump's claim of treason against brave office holders who reminded our military they swear fealty to the Constitution, not Donald Trump;

• and then there are ongoing skirmishes over Jeffrey Epstein's sex crimes. Beneath the noise, there's a smoldering blaze sustaining too many watching women, perhaps slow to ignite, but enduring and combustible.

Somewhat to my surprise, the New York Times has given space to a professor of literature and journalism at American University, Rachel Louise Snyder, [gift link] to lay out the case for legitimate fury among women.

... the emails are just a piece of the larger story: the lengths this country and the systems we’ve created — from the smallest jurisdiction to the national stage — will go to maintain the power of men at the expense of women’s bodies. 

... Mr. Trump is right. He has nothing to hide because he stands to lose nothing. Whatever exists in those files surely will not be enough to wrest him from his perch. At least not yet. ... [He] has overseen an era that might be unique in its willingness to sacrifice democratic institutions and American norms to control women.

As I write, there is a White House proposal that aims to lower the Office on Violence Against Women’s stature within the D.O.J. and cut its shoestring budget by nearly 30 percent. This would devastate shelters, advocacy programs and violence prevention measures, and escalate the danger for victims of intimate partner and familial violence in all corners of the country.

At the same time, a report on violent deaths of girls and women from 2014 to 2020 noted that laws constraining abortion providers were associated with a 3.4 percent rise in the rate of homicides related to intimate partner violence. We are being killed for our own lack of choice. An estimated one in 20 women in the United States gets pregnant from rape or sexual coercion, which equates to a whopping six million women with violence-initiated pregnancies. Six million. Two-thirds of the women who became pregnant from rape were injured during their assaults.

Are you as angry as I am yet? The misogyny that is such a casual part of Mr. Trump’s entire modus operandi gives license to systems that prioritize men’s freedoms over women’s lives. ...

We are entitled to demand more from our leaders, to demand an open investigation into the Epstein files, to demand accountability for the perpetrators regardless of political party or cultural cachet, to demand justice for the children and women trafficked by Mr. Epstein, and perhaps more than anything to demand actual real change in which a broken system is compelled to reinvention.

In the meantime, we are entitled to all of our rage, and men, frankly, we would welcome a moment of gratitude from you that we have not burned this whole damn human enterprise down just yet. ...

Stay mad. Rage is dangerous, but it can be righteous. Our lives depend on it.

Posting may (or may not) be sporadic over Thanksgiving week as family assembles. I expect further outrages in this time when many look away.

Friday deer blogging

 

This inquisitive youngster was attracted by seeds fallen from the bird feeders. The animal showed little distress that I was watching close by. That's too bad, since it's hunting season -- though this spot is too close to a house for hunting to be legal. Eventually what appeared to be the mother rounded up and led away her offspring.

All together now ...

On the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance, the Human Rights Campaign writes:

The Human Rights Campaign is both saddened and infuriated by the deaths of at least thirty-two transgender and gender-expansive people whose lives were tragically and inhumanely taken through violent means, including gun and intimate partner violence, in 2024. 

... These victims, like all of us, were loving partners, parents, family members, friends and community members. They worked, went to school and attended houses of worship. They were real people who did not deserve to have their lives taken.

As we continue working toward justice and equality for trans and gender-expansive people, we celebrate the lives for those we have lost in 2024: 

The link takes you to pictures and short bios of the people killed last year. Explore it if you dare. 

As the Trump regime seeks to erase all gender-nonconforming people, it's up to those of us who can to stand alongside each other. The Trumpkins don't like any of us, but transfolk face violent erasure.

From the No Kings March, October 2025

Donald is sure taking a lot of hits

The pundit class consensus today seems to be that "the tide is turning" against the Donald. So opines JVL at the Bulwark and he's no cockeyed optimist. I'll be skeptical til I get around to assessing for myself what a determined observer can see. 

Meanwhile, here's JVL's list of why we just might save some broken version of American democracy. He enumerates a case that efforts to throw sand in the gears of a rising fascism might be having an impact.

• 7 million people came out to protest the regime.

• The administration’s shutdown of the government turned into a political liability for Trump.

• Trump demanded that Senate Republicans get rid of the filibuster; they refused.

• The MAGA right split on the acceptability of Nick Fuentes and his groypers.

• Democrats won more electoral victories and by far larger margins than polling indicated they would.

• A series of Epstein documents suggested a much closer relationship between Trump and the pedophile than was previously assumed.2

• Four House Republicans defied direct pressure from Trump to a enact a discharge petition and override the speaker’s attempt to avoid an Epstein file vote.

• With the petition signed, enough Republicans were going to defect that Trump had to surrender and “authorize” them to vote for the release of the Epstein files.

• The DHS occupation of Chicago failed. The city did not bend to Trump’s will. The state prevented him from deploying an invading force of Texas National Guard troops.

• Indiana Republicans have resisted Trump’s desire for them to redraw their congressional districts.

• His net approval rating is -14.

Unfortunately, we'll have to see -- and must keep pushing to make it happen

Meanwhile, not considered in JVL's catalogue of Trumpian horrors, is a crypto collapse that takes down large parts of the US financial sector. Could happen. I put my money of Paul Krugman's assessment of crypto. 

 

If only this madness didn't also take down the rest of us. We're running a hella test of Adam Smith's proposition that "there's a great deal of ruin in a nation."

Up, up, and away ...

Six hours on JetBlue, not so bad. A bit of the cattle car sensation, but better than some other airlines. Wonder if that competes successfully?

Then the more interesting bit: a Cape Air night flight in an eight seater to Martha's Vineyard. It was cold and clear and I got to sit behind where the co.pilot would have been, but there wasn't one.

Almost pleasant travel ...

Comically overcomplicated healthcare -- that can also be cruel

A heck of a way to get to a napkin ...

I know I don't understand US healthcare policy. That's in part because I am personally fortunate enough to enjoy a reasonable facsimile of access to adequate medical care via Medicare and the Kaiser Permanente system. 

And it is also because the whole thing is a "Rube Goldburg machine," defined by Wikipedia as "a chain reaction–type machine or contraption intentionally designed to perform a simple task in a comically overcomplicated way."

We can't seem to enact a better way, though I give Democrats credit for sporadically trying to get us there.

But I can refer here to Katelyn Jetelina and Hayden Rooke-Ley's totally lucid description of our mess at Your Local Epidemiologist, timed for the season when many of us have to make decisions about how we'll try to protect ourselves for another year.

5 ways our health care system has become utterly insane

1. Costs vs. wages: A 20-year disconnect. 

Over the past two decades, the cost of employer-sponsored health insurance—how the vast majority of privately insured Americans obtain their health care—has skyrocketed. Premiums, deductibles, and out-of-pocket costs have all soared—far faster than wages. ...

2. We pay the most and get the least.

The United States spends far more on health care than any other wealthy country yet achieves worse outcomes, less access, and a more demoralized workforce. ...

3. Americans don’t “overconsume” health care. Prices and private bloat drive costs.

There’s a common myth, especially amongst policymakers, that we spend too much on health care because we consume too much of it. A similar narrative has taken hold about doctors: because they get paid for each service, they provide too much care. Certainly, there is low-value care in the U.S. health care system. And as profit-seeking corporate actors own more and more of the system, they’re finding ways to bill for more—and more expensive—services.

But Americans don’t visit the doctor more, we don’t go to the hospital more, and we don’t stay in the hospital for longer. ...

4. Corporate and financial firms have taken over care. 

Perhaps the most underappreciated transformation of the past 40 years is the corporate consolidation and financialization of medicine. Care delivery—once local and community-based—is now dominated by corporations. ...

5. Existing approaches have failed—and the latest proposals are more of the same. 

None of this happened by coincidence. Our current governing approach began in the 1980s, when a bipartisan consensus emerged around how to address accelerating costs in the system. The idea was to embrace more free market principles in health care ...

If you want to take a stab at understanding why you hate your health insurance and sometimes even your medical providers, I can't recommend this article too highly. 

Preparations for a looming invasion

Indivisible Brooklyn volunteers with the Hands Off NYC campaign handing out materials to defend neighborhoods from ICE.

 

I love this photo. I haven't lived in New York for many years now, but I can still readily imagine this scene. New Yorkers are tough. They have to be. No wonder Donald hates them and the sentiment is reciprocated.

Boycott Starbucks!

When we lack direct political power -- that is, have enough elected officials who stand for what we might believe in -- it is normal to turn to consumer power to make our point. This is a good impulse. How could I say otherwise as a veteran worker on the great farm worker grape boycott, back in the day?

In this moment of relative powerlessness we are encouraged to participate in plenty of consumer boycotts of firms that one way or another support the Trump regime: Tesla (that's easy for most of us), T-mobile, Amazon, Target. 

But here's another call for a boycott of a more traditional sort: workers are trying to unionize and win contracts at one of the most widely distributed consumer outlets in the country.

With more than a thousand Starbucks baristas on strike across 40 cities and growing, the No Kings Alliance is announcing its support for striking baristas and calling on consumers to pledge not to shop at Starbucks while baristas are on strike. 

For the last four years, Starbucks baristas have powered a historic, inspiring union organizing campaign, taking on one of the most powerful corporations in the world. Yet, the coffee giant continues to fight workers at every turn, cozying up to the anti-union Trump administration and racking up more federal labor law violations than any other corporation in U.S. history. 

Meanwhile, Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol was paid $96 million for just 120 days of work in 2024, paying himself 6,666 times what the average barista made — the worst CEO-to-worker pay inequity in the country. At the same time, Trump and his billionaire backers are doing their best to scare people out of speaking up for their rights on the job and in their communities. 

“We're sick of Starbucks executives seeking to lord over our workplaces, ignore our basic needs, and break labor law—all while the CEO makes millions. That's why we're on an unfair labor practice strike,” said Diego Franco, a Starbucks Workers United barista in Chicago. “Allies like the No Kings Alliance are helping power our movement forward, and we look forward to uniting together on the picket line.” 

Union baristas are demanding higher take-home pay, better hours to improve staffing in stores, and the resolution of hundreds of outstanding unfair labor practice charges for union busting.  

You can sign a boycott pledge here.

The barista role is too many peoples' entry level job these days. If that's to be the case, let's help these workers make it a good one!