"Some Latino voters say the Republican Party supports their hopes for economic advancement."

"That is the case for Luiz Oliveira, 63, an immigrant from Brazil who owns three coffee shops in the Las Vegas area. 'I came here with a dream to live the American dream, and many other immigrants have the same dream,' he said. He said he is wary of Democratic policies that seem too much like socialism. 'Socialism will kill my dream, kill my business,' he said. The Journal poll, which included a large sample of Latino voters, found that views within that group differed by education level. Latino voters with a four-year college degree substantially favored a Democratic candidate over a Republican—61% to 32%—whereas Republicans led or were at parity among those with lower levels of formal education.... 'Black working-class and Hispanic working-class people have a lot more in common with white working-class people than many people have been willing to believe,' said Ruy Teixeira, a demographer at the American Enterprise Institute who writes often on the subject." 

From "GOP Gaining Support Among Black and Latino Voters, WSJ Poll Finds/Republicans appear to be in a better position with both groups heading into the midterms than they were in 2020 or 2018" (Wall Street Journal).

For more from Ruy Teixeira, here's "Hispanic Voters on the Eve of the 2022 Election/Hispanic Voters Are Normie Voters and Normie Voters Aren’t Happy." I was going to blog that a few days ago, but I got so sidetracked into the use of the term "normie"! He writes:

In short, they are normie voters. And like other normie voters, if they feel Democrats are falling short on the things normie voters care about, they are more than willing to punish the party they hold responsible.

"Classic typo," I say when Meade points out the now corrected "teh" in the previous post.

'"It's so classic that it's become..." he says, and I finish the sentence "...a meme."

"I bet there's a Wikipedia article on it," I say, and I'm right!

Teh

"Some might think the blob-like fiberglass forms on Wendy Evans Joseph and Jeffrey Ravetch’s roof terrace look like Al Capp’s sweet-natured Shmoos."

"But for the couple and their landscape architect, Ken Smith, the voluptuous planters are whimsical abstractions of scholars’ rocks, the stones found in traditional Chinese gardens."

Shmoos*... philosophers... you may think there's not much difference.



Ravetch himself brought up the Shmoos... or I would have said that the NYT was wounding their egos, likening the things they like to think of as sophisticated to ridiculous cartoon characters. But Ravetch is in on the joke, and maybe traditional Chinese philosophers would be amused as well. And the couple seems to like a down-to-earth image:

The couple... envisioned a functional space where they could not only entertain friends and have barbecues with their family... but also wash the mud off their two golden retrievers after a weekend at their home in the Hudson Valley....

Mr. Smith... is known for juxtaposing artificial flowers and plants (not to mention things like chain-link fencing and crushed rubber) with grasses, trees and rocks. His rooftop garden for the Museum of Modern Art, visible to only people in the buildings overlooking it, for example, is what he calls “simulated nature”: boulders are hollow plastic, and the boxwood is plastic, too. But he has a deft way with real boxwood and grasses, as well as bamboo and magnolia.

Visible to only people in the buildings overlooking it... What?! Is there some cloak of invisibility blocking the view of golden retrievers?
______________________________

* Shmoos:

Cartoonist Al Capp was already world-famous and a millionaire in 1948 when he introduced an armless pear-shaped character called the Shmoo into his daily "Li'l Abner" strip. The unusual creature loved humans. A Shmoo laid eggs and bottles of Grade A milk in an instant, and would gladly die and change itself into a sizzling steak if its owner merely looked at it hungrily. Its skin was fine leather, its eyes made perfect buttons and even its whiskers made excellent toothpicks. Shmoos multiplied much faster than rabbits, so owning a pair of Shmoos meant that any family was self-sufficient. Of course the Shmoos proved too good for humanity's sake and therein was the basis for Capp's ultimate (and tragic) satire....

Come on! That's philosophy, no?

Buy Al Capp's "The Short Life and Happy Times of the Shmoo."