2:00PM Water Cooler 10/24/2024 | naked capitalism

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Bird Song of the Day

Common Nightingale, Vía sin nombre, Villafranca, Navarra, Comunidad Foral de, Spain. “Foraging or eating.”

In Case You Might Miss…

1. Anti-Trump oppo barrage begins.
2. Kamala’s town hall.
3. Ohio pension funds sue Boeing, strike continues.

Politics

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

2024

Less tjhwo weeks to go!

Friday’s RCP Poll Averages:

Lambert here: Big Mo shifts toward Trump, this week, even in WI (that is, if you ignore the entire concept of margin of error). Of course, we on the outside might as well be examining the entrails of birds when we try to predict what will happen to the subset of voters (undecided; irregular) in a subset of states (swing), and the irregulars, especially, who will determine the outcome of the election but might as well be quantum foam, but presumably the campaign professionals have better data, and have the situation as under control as it can be _{MR SUBLIMINAL Fooled ya. Kidding!}.

“Where are the voters who could decide the presidential election?” [Associated Press].

* * *

Town Hall:

Kamala (D): Watch with the sound down first (1):

Harris: “I don’t know anyone who has seen the images who would not have strong feelings…much less those who have relatives who’ve been killed.
I also do know that many people who care about this issue care about bringing down the price of groceries…”
pic.twitter.com/p76E0JxEdX

— aster (@ArsonAtDennys) October 24, 2024

I was wrong. Kamala’s closing argument isn’t genocide + war machine; it’s genocide + groceries. Fifty slaps with a wet noodle for Lambert.

Kamala (D): Watch with the sound down first (2):

I think for a second her mind told her to say that a mistake she has made as VP is that she often didn’t prepare enough — Lester Holt interview, for instance — but she couldn’t find a way to say it smoothly so bailed into this nonsense answer. pic.twitter.com/fbM0C2miXc

— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) October 24, 2024

Lots of Democrats saying “This is normal, what’s the issue?” but what I notice is that she doesn’t actually answer the question.

Kamala (D): “Axelrod: Kamala Harris Goes To “Word Salad City” When She Doesn’t Want To Answer A Question, ‘Didn’t Concede Much’ [RealClearPolitics]. Axelrod: “Look, I think it was a mixed night, okay? I think she was very strong coming out of the gate, and she obviously came with a purpose, which she wanted to, they want to shine a focus on, you know, this latest chapter with the Hitler story of John Kelly, but generally anti-democratic behavior and the threat that represents.” A topic which The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg (see below), entirely by coincidence, had teed up. More: “[But] when she doesn’t want to answer a question, her habit is to kind of go to word salad city. And she did that on a couple of answers…. One was on Israel. Anderson asked a direct question, would you be stronger on Israel than Trump? And there was a seven minute answer, but none of it related to the question he was asking. And so, you know, on certain questions like that, on immigration, I thought she missed an opportunity because she would acknowledge no concerns about any of the administration’s policies.” The second: “No one’s going to be Bill Clinton, but you do want to relate to the people in front of you. She didn’t do a lot of that. She didn’t ask them questions. She didn’t address them particularly. So she was giving set pieces too much, but she said something at the end that I thought should be actually a frame. If they want to go down this road, this is a great frame. She said, he’ll have an enemies list. I’ll have a to-do list. And the to-do list is going to be the concerns you mentioned tonight.” • As if the Democrats didn’t have an enemies list. Just ask Thomas Frank what happened after he wrote Listen, Liberal! Adding: I think I can discount Trump’s puffery and bullshit reasonably well at this point; but I don’t know how to discount Kamala’s word salad at all.

* * *

Kamala (D): “Harris and Trump need Gen Z. Is TikTok the answer?” [Financial Times]. “To increase Harris’s reach when she became the Democratic candidate in July, her camp hired what deputy campaign manager Rob Flaherty described as a pack of “feral 25-year-olds” to latch on to trending music and popular editing styles in real time. They have generated their own viral videos on issues including abortion and climate change, alongside Trump bloopers. At the same time, the campaign openly courted creators on the platform, inviting them to glitzy White House events and to the Democratic National Convention, in the hope their messaging would spread organically to their own sizeable TikTok followings.  Trump’s TikTok has presented a more sombre offering — videos set to menacing music, with dark predictions about the economy and soaring immigration under a Harris presidency, and pieces-to-camera by the former president warning of a ‘nation in decline’. These are interspersed with clips of light-hearted meetups with young male creators, such as prankster Logan Paul and video game streamer Adin Ross, who are closely affiliated with the so-called manosphere, or online spaces focused on masculinity. Harris’s TikTok strategy is ‘aspirational for any brand, let alone a politician’, where Trump’s feels ‘less native’ to TikTok and closer to traditional campaign material, according to Cohen.” • Dunno how “traditional” Logal Paul, who I loathe, is.

* * *

Trump (R): “Donald Trump takes lead over Kamala Harris on US economy in final FT poll” [Financial Times]. “The final monthly poll for the FT and the University of Michigan Ross School of Business found 44 per cent of registered voters said they trusted Trump more to handle the economy versus 43 per cent for Harris. The findings, which come less than two weeks before the election, mark the first time Trump has led Harris on the issue in the FT-Michigan Ross poll. The poll also found Trump with a wider lead among voters on the question of which candidate would leave them better off financially. Forty-five per cent picked the Republican former president — a five-point improvement from the previous month — compared with 37 per cent for Harris, the Democratic vice-president.” • Hmm.

* * *

Here we go:

Trump (R): “Trump accused of groping former model as Jeffrey Epstein watched the ‘twisted game’” [WION]. • Now? In 2024? Really?

Trump (R): “Trump: ‘I Need the Kind of Generals That Hitler Had’” [Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic]. The kind that win wars? (To be fair, except with Russia _{MR SUBLIMINAL Ouch!}.) No, but seriously. IDF prison guard and Amalek stan Jeffrey Goldberg, writing on the eve of an election in Democrat contributor slash Kamala BFF Laurene Powell Jobs’ glossy magazine would not be my goto on this story, even if I believe war pig Milley, which I don’t, because his rice bowl trough is at stake. (Sadly, the provenance of this picture including the Atlantic’s publisher seems sketchy (image search)). Honestly, when Kamala makes her closing argument on the National Mall Tuesday, I’m picturing a big screen behind her, multi-story, with images of Nuremberg mixed in with J6. (I hope she includes the dude with his feet on Pelosi’s desk. The aghastitude!)

Trump (R): “A short list of things and people Democrats have told you are Nazis and/or Hitler” [@sunnyright, ThreadReaderApp]. • Rather a lot, and for a long time. In any case, their treatment of Nazis, even leaving Azov aside, seems a bit… situational:

A week ago, Chuck Schumer was sitting next to Hitler, laughing at his jokes and having a good time.

— Damon Imani (@damonimani) October 23, 2024

Part of the Goldberg piece–

Trump (R): “Sister of slain army private and others speak out after alleged 2020 Trump remark” [Guardian]. “A row has broken out in the aftermath of a report from the Atlantic that claims Donald Trump refused to cover the funeral costs of a soldier who was murdered at a Texas military base in 2020. The deceased woman’s sister came to the defense of the former US president amid a wave of backlash against Trump…. ‘I don’t appreciate how you are exploiting my sister’s death for politics – hurtful & disrespectful to the important changes she made for service members,’ she wrote, referring to a bipartisan federal law named after Vanessa, which requires, among other things, that sexual harassment complaints involving service members be sent to an independent investigator, which was signed into law in 2021 by the Biden administration. In her statement, Mayra added: ‘President Donald Trump did nothing but show respect to my family & Vanessa. In fact, I voted for President Trump today.’” • So, not only is Goldberg a goon, he insulted a Latino family. Good job! The family lawyer speaks:

After having dealt with hundreds of reporters in my legal career, this is unfortunately the first time I have to go on record and call out Jeffrey Goldberg@the Atlantic: not only did he misrepresent our conversation but he outright LIED in HIS sensational story.
More… https://t.co/uJtfsNTo37

— Attorney Natalie Khawam (@WhistleblowerLF) October 22, 2024

Trump (R): Musical interlude:

The Trump-Hitler story is a psyop.

I mean that literally, not figuratively. It’s a military-grade, multi-stage psychological operation, engineered to re-energize demoralized Harris supporters and—through stigmatization—reduce turnout among Trump supporters.

Here’s how it works:… pic.twitter.com/SPZeydSyUO

— Robert Sterling (@RobertMSterling) October 24, 2024

Worth a clickthrough. I disagree with the account’s institutional model, but the outcome is the same.

Trump (R): “‘They’re Just Over It’: How Trump Has Converted Male Frustration Into a Movement” [Politico]. The deck: “In the crucial swing state of North Carolina, a quixotic concert unveiled how Trump and his allies have shrewdly maneuvered to capture young men in 2024.” NC, but the implications are general: “Now, as Vice President Kamala Harris fights to win back the young-male cohort that helped propel President Joe Biden to victory over Trump in 2020, Democrats are frantically wondering what caused an erosion of support in polls compared to four years ago.” And: “‘The feeling I get from young men is, they’re just over it. They’re just over the lecturing, being told their issues don’t count as much,’ Richard Reeves, a senior fellow at Brookings and the president of the American Institute for Boys and Men, told me. In recent weeks, Reeves has emerged as something of a guru on the erosion of young male support for Democrats. Culturally, ‘We’ve replaced the idea of ‘original sin’ with the post-modern idea of toxic masculinity,’ said Reeves. Some may see justice in this after centuries of male domination. But while politics is often about justice, it’s also about feelings, and being heard, and sending messages.” And: “Trump, by contrast, has catered to right-leaning influencers with legions of young male fans. He’s made campaign stops with Nelk’s Kyle Forgeard, and done media hits with comedian podcasters Theo Von and Andrew Schulz, video game streamer Adin Ross, and technology investor David Sacks’ All In podcast. His RNC was headlined by the likes of UFC founder Dana White, Kid Rock and Hulk Hogan. Arrange those faces on a Pinterest board and here’s what you’ll see: a coalition of multigenerational Bro-dom, older versions of the young men streaming into the Flagstock gates.” • I loathe the term “bro,” which I associated with drunken boorishness. Perhaps it’s a generational thing.

* * *
* * *

GA: “My insanely premature analysis of Georgia’s first week of early voting” [Trouble in God’s Country]. “So far, voter turnout in the 10 storm-ravaged 75% Trump counties has actually been just a hair higher than in the other 28 counties. The 10 “individual assistance” counties have turned out at a 19.19% rate versus 18.98% for the other 28 counties. In other words, voters in the strongest pro-Trump counties haven’t let wind and rain of Biblical proportions keep them away from the polls so far. Here’s another thing that ought to worry Democrats. In the 2020 presidential election, Biden and the Democrats won the mail vote battle. Trump famously decried the use of mail-in votes, and many of his supporters apparently bought into his complaints. Biden wound up with nearly twice as many mail votes as Trump – 848,726 to 450,522. The split between Democratic and Republican counties was remarkably similar: 823,757 mail votes were cast in the 30 Democratic counties versus 491,537 in the 129 GOP counties. So far this year, the 129 Republican counties are casting more mail ballots than the 30 Democratic counties. Through Sunday’s voting, 47,626 mail votes had been cast in the GOP counties versus 32,476 in the Democratic counties. Interestingly, substantially more mail ballots had been applied for in the Democratic counties – 164,902 to 121,085 in the Republican counties – but the Democratic return rate is obviously much lower, only about half what the Republican counties are doing.” And concluding: “It’s time for Team Harris to get its vaunted ground game in gear.” • A bit late.

Democrats en Déshabillé

“How Did the Democrats Get Here?” (interview) [Tim Shenk, The Nation]. Shenk: “Setting priorities is especially difficult today because of a change that’s taken place in the Democratic coalition: the loss of working-class voters and the influx of educated professionals. This hasn’t stopped Democrats from moving left pretty much across the board over the last decade, but it’s a serious obstacle to building a durable majority that could pass structural reforms, and it raises hard questions about why so many people the left wants to speak for are moving toward Republicans.” • Sheesh, first answer and the dude makes the fundamental cateogory error of confusing liberals and the left (a party that wants working class ownership of the means of production is not liberal).

Syndemics

“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison

Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).

Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!

Resources, United States (Local): 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 reports); 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).

Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).

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

Hat tips to helpful 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, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).

Stay safe out there!

Look for the Helpers

I think Ed Yong is so great I will give him this honored place instead of trying to categorize the content:

Posters:

🩷🖤 *NEW* COVID GRAPHICS 🖤🩷

I am LOVING these fantastic new graphics, designed by @uppercasemag for @TheWHN.

Simple. Typographic. Factual.

Please share far & wide to raise awareness.

More graphics & downloadable pdfs:
🔗 https://t.co/5y4pf9Ow7t https://t.co/I9XUmPhjS9 pic.twitter.com/QRC5JULLdm

— Cat in the Hat 🐈‍⬛ 🎩 🇬🇧 (@_CatintheHat) October 24, 2024

Vaccines: Covid

“Repeated COVID-19 mRNA-based vaccination contributes to SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibody responses in the mucosa” [Science]. But from the Editor’s Summary: “mRNA vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 elicit robust antibody responses in the circulation, which aid in protection from severe disease. However, the extent to which mRNA vaccines, which are delivered intramuscularly, can elicit mucosal immune responses is unclear. In a pair of papers, Declercq et al. and Lasrado et al. come to distinct conclusions. Using human nasal swab samples in both studies, Declercq et al. show that repeated vaccination for SARS-CoV-2 promotes neutralizing antibodies in the nose, whereas Lasrado et al. observed no obvious increase in neutralizing antibody titers after booster vaccination. These differing results may be due to the number of SARS-CoV-2 vaccinations or exposures, time since last exposure, and experimental approaches, but this pair of papers underscores the need to better understand the mucosal immune response in humans.” • Oh.

Elite Maleficence

Bonnie Henry tells:

1. This clip has received a large amount of very justified criticism already, so I’ll confine my comments to a couple of points. First, listen to her voice after she says, ‘…good thing’. There’s an obvious hesitation there, because, in my opinion, she knows she’s incorrect. https://t.co/gaIDdU3cWm

— Conor Browne (@brownecfm) October 23, 2024

And:

3. … again for a few months or so.

The logical conclusion of that argument is that if it’s good to not have to worry about getting Covid for a while, *getting Covid is de facto something to worry about*.

Dissonant arguments reveal much more than people realise.

/end

— Conor Browne (@brownecfm) October 23, 2024

If getting infected is good because you won’t get infected, why not just get infected in the first place?

TABLE 1: Daily Covid Charts

Employment Situation: “United States Initial Jobless Claims” [Trading Economics]. “The number of individuals filing for unemployment benefits in the US fell by 15,000 from the previous week to 227,000 on the period ending October 19th, the lowest since the start of the month, and well below market expectations that they would have remained at 242,000. The drop extended the view that the US labor market remains relatively resilient to restrictive interest rates by the Federal Reserve, strengthening bets that the central bank will refrain from delivering more aggressive rate cuts in upcoming decisions.”

Manufacturing: “United States Kansas Fed Manufacturing Index” [Trading Economics]. “The Kansas City Fed’s Manufacturing Production index was at 0 in October of 2024, holding the decline in the tenth district’s factory activity reflected by the -18 in the previous month, loosely aligned with the poor momentum for manufacturing in other key regions of the United States.”

Housing: “United States Building Permits” [Trading Economics]. “Building permits in the United States fell by 3.1% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.425 million in September 2024, revised down from a preliminary estimate of 1.428 million.”

The Economy: “United States Chicago Fed National Activity Index” [Trading Economics]. “The Chicago Fed National Activity Index decreased to -0.28 in September 2024 from a revised -0.01 in August.”

Manufacturing: “Ohio Pension Funds Sue Boeing and Former Chairman Over Plane Failures” (press release) [AccessWire]. “Now two pension funds for the State of Ohio are demanding answers from Boeing and its board members (both current and former) about the devaluation of their investment. Attorney General Dave Yost announced Tuesday that he is suing the board of directors for the Washington, DC-based jet manufacturer, ‘seeking accountability for a pattern of safety and compliance failures that have harmed the company and its investors.’ Yost is representing the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System and the State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio in the litigation, and accuses Boeing board members of breaching their fiduciary duties by failing to properly oversee the company. The lawsuit alleges the members knew ‘about the ongoing unsafe practices but even today fail to address them, choosing instead to prioritize profits over safety and regulatory compliance.’ Among the defendants singled out by Yost is former Boeing chairman Kellner, who departed from the company under a cloud earlier this year, following the Alaska Airlines incident and other safety failures, in what CNN described as ‘a complete decapitation” of leadership.” • Hardly complete.

Manufacturing: “Boeing strike continues as union rejects contract, scuttling CEO’s recovery plan” [The Register]. “The new contract was rejected by 64 percent of union members the same day Boeing announced a dreadful quarter capped off by $6.1 billion in losses… ‘Workers across America know what it’s like for a company to take and take – and Boeing workers are saying they are fully and strongly committed to balancing that out by winning back more of what was taken from them by the company for more than a decade,’ IAM District 751 president Jon Holden and IAM District W24 president Brandon Bryant said of the failed vote. The ‘take and take’ Holden and Bryant refer to is likely to do with one of the biggest sticking points in the negotiations – workers’ pensions. Boeing phased out fixed-benefit pensions in 2014 in favor of 401(k) portfolios for employees, and union members have made clear since negotiations began that they wanted those fixed benefits back, something the company hasn’t budged on.” • If Boeing doesn’t turn around on the shop floor, it doesn’t turn around. So why is Boeing working to screw everybody on the shop floor as hard as they can?

Manufacturing: “Boeing Workers Resoundingly Reject New Contract and Extend Strike” [New York Times]. “‘”There’s much more work to do. We will push to get back to the table, we will push for the members’ demands as quickly as we can,’ said Jon Holden, president of District 751 of the union, which represents the vast majority of the workers and has led in the talks. He delivered that message at the union’s Seattle headquarters to a room of members chanting, ” • Hmm. Reminds me of something….

Manufacturing: “American Airlines CEO wishes Boeing wasn’t ‘just a distraction’” [Chicago Business] “American Airlines Group Inc.’s CEO said he looks forward to the day when Boeing Co. is not just a distraction,’ highlighting the growing frustration among the planemaker’s biggest customers. ‘We’ve been struggling with them over the last five years,’ Robert Isom told CNBC Thursday, noting that American can deliver the capacity it has planned for the remainder of this year but that he worries about promised Boeing plane deliveries in the future…. ‘We need them to deliver quality aircraft on time,’ he said. ‘I look forward to the phone call when Boeing says we’re able to do so.’” • Ouch!

Manufacturing: “Boeing Workers Spurn Latest Offer as Bid to End Strike Fails” [New York Times]. “‘I’m in favor of a fair contract,’ said Charles Fromong, 59, a machine tool repair mechanic working for Boeing’s military aircraft division. ‘The strike is just a byproduct of Boeing not paying people what they are worth.’”

Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 65 Greed (previous close: 63 Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 70 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Oct 24 at 1:11:05 PM ET.

Gallery

“Behold the Messy Creative Process of Fifty Celebrated Painters in ‘The Artist’s Palette’” [This Is Colossal]. “One could argue that every great painting produces two works of art: the canvas and the surface where the pigments are mixed…. [Alexandra Loske, in The Artist’s Palette,] presents the physical palettes—dried paint, worn edges, well-exercised hinges, stained wood, and all—alongside one or more of each artist’s paintings. She also analyzes the mixture of pigments, highlighting color relationships that illuminate both the methods used and the choices that led to a finished work.” • Edward Hopper’s:

Guillotine Watch

“Things to Do in the Hamptons This Week, October 25-31, 2024” [Dan’s Papers]. • “The Hamptons are not a defensible position.” –Mark Blythe

I know I shouldn’t be such a Debbie Downer, but there’s something about that photo that just gets me.

Class Warfare

Worth a clickthrough.

News of the Wired

“This simple balance test may be best way to track how well you’re aging” [Study FInds]. “The research, published in PLOS ONE, finds that among healthy adults over 50, the time someone could maintain balance on one leg — particularly their non-dominant leg — showed the fastest rate of decline with age compared to other physical measures. This simple test proved to be equally effective for both men and women…. Surprisingly, while walking patterns remained relatively stable across age groups, other measures showed significant age-related declines. The ability to stand on one leg decreased most dramatically — about 2.2 seconds per decade for the non-dominant leg and 1.7 seconds for the dominant leg. This was followed by increased body sway during two-legged standing and declining grip and knee strength.” • News you can use!

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