"The first guy to sit down across from her had scanned the room, crossed his arms, and leaned back as if waiting for her to speak. (Total turnoff.)"

"'Another guy was super shy. He was holding his arms out and leaning close to me and almost whispering.' It was nice being able to see how tall people actually were—she’d found that height is something that men tend to obscure online. She said that she doesn’t want to seem shallow, but she realized that 'when I’m in the room with someone, I’m gathering information unconsciously.' She was proud of herself for trying speed dating. Still... [t]he experience had been draining. 'Toward the fourth person, I got kind of exhausted. I couldn’t even remember their names.'"

From "Finding Love in a Hopeless Place/In-person dating is back, and it’s seemingly more awkward than ever" by Lizzie Widdicombe (The New Yorker).

ADDED: "[S]he’d found that height is something that men tend to obscure online. She said that she doesn’t want to seem shallow...." Shallowness is something we tend to obscure online. But really is it shallow to admit that you are an animal, a body responding instinctively, whatever excuses and explanations you layer on top?

The immortal Feinstein.

I'm reading "California Recall: Unpredictable Election Has Democrats Concerned About Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s Seat" (CBS, San Francisco):

It’s the Democrats’ doomsday scenario: California Gov. Gavin Newsom loses his recall race this fall, and a Senate vacancy is later filled by a GOP governor. And the 50-50 Senate, currently controlled by Democrats, is run again by Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell.

Nobody wants to talk about it openly, but Dianne Feinstein is 88 years old.

In an interview with CNN, Feinstein made clear the recall election won’t affect her plans to serve out her full six years — no matter the outcome of the race. “Why would I?” Feinstein said when asked if she would consider resigning in the period between a Newsom loss and before a GOP governor could be sworn in. Feinstein added: “It doesn’t affect me — the recall is just against him.” Asked if she had even considered stepping aside as the recall campaign has gotten underway, Feinstein said: “No.”

That's Ruth Bader Ginsburg style grit.

Now, maybe she'll cave to pressure if Newsom actually loses. There could be a 38-day period before the new GOP governor takes office. 

"The nation’s top national security officials assembled at the Pentagon early on April 24 for a secret meeting to plan the final withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan...."

"... Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III and Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, met with top White House and intelligence officials. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken joined by video conference. After four hours, two things were clear. First, Pentagon officials said they could pull out the remaining 3,500 American troops, almost all deployed at Bagram Air Base, by July 4.... Second, State Department officials said they would keep the American Embassy open, with more than 1,400 remaining Americans protected by 650 Marines and soldiers. An intelligence assessment presented at the meeting estimated that Afghan forces could hold off the Taliban for one to two years. There was brief talk of an emergency evacuation plan — helicopters would ferry Americans to the civilian airport in Kabul, the capital — but no one raised, let alone imagined, what the United States would do if the Taliban gained control of access to that airport, the only safe way in and out of the country once Bagram closed. The plan was a good one, the group concluded.... 'It’s a rational drawdown with our allies,' [Biden] insisted [on July 2d], 'so there’s nothing unusual about it.' But as the questions persisted, on Afghanistan rather than the economy, he grew visibly annoyed.... 'I want to talk about happy things, man.'"

From "Miscue After Miscue, U.S. Exit Plan Unravels/President Biden promised an orderly withdrawal. That pledge, compounded by missed signals and miscalculations, proved impossible" (NYT).

ADDED: If you go into the comments over there at the NYT and you put them in order of "most liked," you'll see an unbroken chain of comments supporting Joe Biden: "It seems to me that the media is being less than fair to Joe Biden over this," "Has it really gone wrong?," "Did the Trump Surrender Agreement with the Taliban provide for evacuation? If it did, what did it say? If it didn’t, why not?," "Frankly I’m dismayed that the media is now declaring this a disaster," "Thanks President Biden for making this brave decision albeit flawed execution. When we end this if there are no US troop live lost and Americans evacuated with as much of our allies. It will be remembered as a very good decision and no one will care about execution like Vietnam withdrawal."

"Desperation as Afghans Seek to Flee a Country Retaken by the Taliban/A surging crowd trampled a toddler to death near the airport...."

The NYT reports. 

On Saturday morning, a former interpreter for an American company in Kabul... pushed ahead, desperate to secure a flight out of the country for everyone accompanying her — her husband, 2-year-old daughter, disabled parents, three sisters and a cousin. Then the crowd surged. The entire family was slammed to the ground. People trampled them where they lay.... The girl was dead, trampled to death by the mob....

Another former interpreter for the U.S. military was also in hiding in Kabul Saturday. He... said he had abandoned any hope of getting a flight for him, his wife and young son after two terrifying forays to the airport. “I’ve lost hope,” he said. “I’ve lost trust in the U.S. government, which keeps saying, ‘We will evacuate our allies. Evacuation is impossible.... Your child could get trampled.... If the U.S. gives me the entire universe after I lose a child, it is worthless.” 

Biden is betting Americans don't care about Afghanistan and we'll blind ourselves to the ongoing catastrophe.

Looking at the "Most Read" list at The Washington Post this morning, I think he might win that bet.

How many Maryland workers does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Grandma wants a hug. Covid's still percolating in the dumbosphere. And a lady lost a footrace. 

America curls up and gets cozy. That virus is going after Republicans who sorta deserve it. The birdies didn't deserve the murderous workers. Are we getting our snuggie-wuggles from the kiddies? Feeling better to know that the runner who didn't run in the Olympics probably wouldn't've won anyway? 

It's comfy to tsk at the Gramma who loves too much, the unvaccinated dead man, the Mississippians buying their medicine at the feed store, the workers who killed birds. 

It's manageable caring. Shed a tear for a bird and another bird! Keep it up, and Joe's bet is won.

At the Sunrise Café...

 ... you can talk about anything you want.

"Because of potential security threats outside the gates at the Kabul airport, we are advising U.S. citizens to avoid traveling to the airport and to avoid airport gates at this time."

Says a security alert just issued by the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, quoted in "US Embassy in Afghanistan tells citizens to stay away from Kabul airport" (NY Post).

"The Clyburn-led veterans [of the Congressional Black Caucus] have hugged close to Ms. Pelosi to rise through the ranks, and believe younger members should follow their example."

"They have taken a zero-tolerance stance toward primary challengers to Democratic incumbents. They have recently pushed for a pared-down approach to voting rights legislation, attacking proposals for public financing of campaigns and independent redistricting committees, which have support from many Democrats in Congress but could change the makeup of some Black members’ congressional districts. And when younger members of Congress press Ms. Pelosi to elevate new blood and overlook seniority, this more traditional group points to Representatives Maxine Waters of California and Bennie Thompson of Mississippi — committee chairs who waited years for their gavels.... Mr. Clyburn makes no secret of his disdain for progressive activists who support defunding the police. In the interview, he likened the idea to 'Burn, baby, burn,' the slogan associated with the 1965 Watts riots in California. '"Burn, baby, burn" destroyed the movement John Lewis and I helped found back in 1960,' he said. 'Now we have defunding the police.' [Rep. Gregory] Meeks, the political point man for the caucus, said he expected its endorsements to go where they have always gone: to Black incumbents and their allies."

From "The Congressional Black Caucus: Powerful, Diverse and Newly Complicated/The group, which includes most Black members of Congress, remains publicly united. But in private, an influx of new members who think differently about its purpose are making a play for the future" (NYT).

"To me, the crime is that Monica, Linda and Paula had no control over how they were perceived... It was unbelievable, the hate."

Said Sarah Burgess, a producer and writer of most of the 10-episode series "Impeachment," quoted in "'Impeachment' Focuses on the Women Behind Clinton’s Scandals/In a group interview, Ryan Murphy and the stars and creators of the FX drama discuss why they made Linda Tripp and Monica Lewinsky the stars of the show, and why we still care" (NYT).

Set in the 1990s, the 10-episode series revisits the miasma of scandal and innuendo that shrouded the Clinton White House: Paula Jones’s sexual harassment lawsuit against President Bill Clinton; Clinton’s sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky; Lewinsky’s friendship with Linda Tripp; and the tangle of lies, half-truths and illicit recordings that were ultimately detailed in the Starr Report, the infamous and lurid document prepared by the independent counsel Kenneth Starr....

From the group interview with Annaleigh Ashford (Paula Jones), Sarah Paulson (Linda Tripp), Beanie Feldstein (Monica Lewinsky), and Ryan Murphy (who isn't really identified in the article/we're just told it's "Ryan Murphy's 'Impeachment'):

"'The Larry Project,' neurotic and tender by turns, evolved into a much more emotional, all-encompassing undertaking — in which the absent Larry, whom Ms. Upson never met..."

"... expanded into the artist’s muse, her lover, her persecutor and, ultimately, her doppelgänger. By the end, no clean distinction was left between artist and subject; the two had become doubles. One drawing in the Hammer Museum show bore the words 'I am more he than he is.' The project ended in 2011 with a performance at a Los Angeles gallery at which she dragged a charcoal-and-wax mannequin of Larry on the walls and floor inside a plywood cube until the effigy disintegrated, symbolically turning Larry’s body into dust."

 
"Kaari Upson, California Artist of Desire and Disturbance, Dies at 51/Known for her resin sculptures and her disquieting videos, she was one of the most significant artists to emerge from the vibrant 21st-century Los Angeles art scene" (NYT). (Upson died of breast cancer.)

A contemporaneous artist obituary: "Chuck Close, Artist of Outsized Reality, Dies at 81/He found success with his large-scale Photorealist portraits, becoming one of the leading artists of his generation. Late in life he faced allegations of sexual harassment" (NYT):

In the 1970s, he began to translate his photographic sources into pixelated images, filling in the individual cells of a grid with distinct marks, colors and tones that would cohere into photographic images when viewed from a distance....  His pragmatic, problem-solving approach would serve Mr. Close well in the second half of his career. In New York, on Dec. 7, 1988, he was felled by what turned out to be a collapsed spinal artery, which initially left him paralyzed from the neck down. In the ensuing months of rehabilitation, he began to regain movement in his arms, and he was able to sit up and paint using brushes strapped to his hand. He not only returned to painting with unimpaired ambition but also began producing what many would view as the best work of his career.... Up close, the new paintings seemed to swarm with woozy, almost psychedelic energy, while from a distance the image would emerge in all its photographic exactness.

As for the allegations of sexual harassment, a doctor is quoted attributing his actions to Alzheimer's disease: "He was very disinhibited and did inappropriate things, which were part of his underlying medical condition. Frontotemporal dementia affects executive function. It’s like a patient having a lobotomy — it destroys that part of the brain that governs behavior and inhibits base instincts."

"The FBI has found 'scant' evidence the Jan. 6 insurrection was the result of an organized plot..."

"'Ninety to ninety-five percent of these are one-off cases,' an anonymous former official said of the nearly 600 people who have been arrested for their involvement in the attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 presidential election. 'Then you have five percent, maybe, of these militia groups that were more closely organized. But there was no grand scheme with Roger Stone and Alex Jones and all of these people to storm the Capitol and take hostages."'  

Writes Joel Mathis at The Week in "The Jan. 6 'plot' that wasn't." Mathis strains to patch together something like a conspiracy theory:

There didn't need to be a secret conspiracy. Instead, it sounds more like self-radicalization as a mass phenomenon. The term "self-radicalization" has been used in recent years to describe the underlying causes of lone-wolf terror attacks like the... Orlando's Pulse nightclub, or the Pensacola shooter... [or] Dylann Roof.... What is Jan. 6, if not a similar phenomenon... only with all the wolves gathered in a single, very important location for the same purpose? None of this gets Trump off the hook.... The people who came to Washington D.C. on Jan. 6 did so at Trump's invitation, and then marched to the Capitol at his behest. He didn't have to plot with anybody — he just had to rile up his followers, then point them in the right direction. 

They were protesters, though, not killers! They behaved like protesters, going to the place where the thing they were protesting was happening. If they'd been like Roof or like the Pulse or Pensacola shooters, they'd have done something much more violent than trespassing on the building.

By the way, I've been wondering what might have happened if the Senators had not all gotten the same idea at the same time and run out of the Senate chamber, leaving it to the protesters. What if a Senator or 2 or 3 had stayed in place, where they belonged and the protesters had to face them? 

We've been encouraged to think the protesters would have brutalized them. But what if one Senator had the nerve and the presence of mind to stand his (or her) ground and confront them with words? I'm thinking of something about law and civilization....

 

"A man just naturally can't take the law into his own hands and hang people without hurtin' everybody in the world, 'cause then he's just not breaking one law but all laws.... It's the very conscience of humanity..... Your husband, Donald." (I left the "Your husband, Donald" part in the otherwise heavily elided quote, because... it surprised me... weirdly.)

"Biden Ran on Competence and Empathy. Afghanistan Is Testing That. The chaotic endgame of the American withdrawal has undercut some of the most fundamental premises of President Biden’s presidency."

That's the lengthy headline for a "news analysis" piece by Peter Baker in the NYT.  

Had you been under the impression that the Biden presidency was premised on empathy and competence? I'd never gotten that impression, and I did a search of my blog archive for "Biden" and "empathy," and everything that came up was about the press shielding Biden from scrutiny, saying he's got empathy and (of course) Trump does not. I haven't done a search, but I'll hypothesize that running on competence worked the same way. The press touted Biden as a remedy for the disease they'd been scaring us about for years — Trump. 

And so Biden wasn't tested. He was promoted. Did we ever believe in his "competence and empathy"? Are anybody's "fundamental premises" getting undermined? That headline — however much it questions Biden — engages in the same unexamined touting of Biden that got him elected in the first place. He never demonstrated competence and empathy! People just hoped he had it, because they thought Trump didn't have it, and the press encouraged them to indulge in those beliefs and hopes. 

I'm questioning assumptions contained in the headline. The article itself is questioning Biden's competence and empathy, which I think ought to have been done when he was running for office. From the article:

At points, the president has evinced little sense of the human toll as the Taliban swept back to power. Asked about pictures of fleeing Afghans packed into planes and some even falling to their death after trying to sneak aboard, Mr. Biden interrupted. “That was four days ago, five days ago,” he said, when in fact it was two days earlier and hardly made less horrific by the passage of a couple of sunsets.... 

Biden — or his handlers — knew he'd be asked about that, and he said something that was not only bluntly callous but wrong in the way that is most easily proved wrong — numerically. 

Meanwhile, American citizens are called upon to care deeply about things that happened over a hundred years ago and to work diligently on their psyche if they think it would be best to look optimistically toward the future and not dwell on the distant past. 

At the Morning Glory Café...

... please feel free to discuss the topics that don't fit any of today's posts.

"If you have a forest of barriers in a classroom, it’s going to interfere with proper ventilation of that room... Everybody’s aerosols are going to be trapped and stuck there..."

"... and building up, and they will end up spreading beyond your own desk.... One way to think about plastic barriers is that they are good for blocking things like spitballs but ineffective for things like cigarette smoke. The smoke simply drifts around them, so they will give the person on the other side a little more time before being exposed to the smoke. Meanwhile, people on the same side with the smoker will be exposed to more smoke, since the barriers trap it on that side until it has a chance to mix throughout the space."

Said Linsey Marr, "professor of civil and environmental engineering at Virginia Tech and one of the world’s leading experts on viral transmission," quoted in "Those Anti-Covid Plastic Barriers Probably Don’t Help and May Make Things Worse/Clear barriers have sprung up at restaurants, nail salons and school classrooms, but most of the time, they do little to stop the spread of the coronavirus" (NYT).

"Let me be clear: Any American who wants to come home, we will get you home. I cannot promise what the final outcome will be, or that it will be without the risk of loss."

Does that even make sense on its face? It's from Biden's speech today, quoted in "President Biden tries to restore calm, vowing to rescue Americans and Afghan allies" (NYT). 

He says "Let me be clear," but it's not clear. Because "Any American who wants to come home, we will get you home" sounds like a promise to bring all Americans home (if that's what they want), and the next sentence negates the promise: "I cannot promise what the final outcome will be...." 

He must have meant we will try to get you home. Well, of course, they are trying. But will they succeed? He cannot promise what the final outcome will be. Yes, that's what we thought, based on what we can observe, so what did you add? 

Later, he said, "What interest do we have in Afghanistan at this point, with Al Qaeda gone?" Did he forget the interest in extricating Americans and the people who have worked with Americans? I don't think he forgot. I think he expects us to forget!

ADDED: He started 50 minutes late and he mispronounced approximately every other word.

"Airplanes and helicopters... are unlikely to provide the Taliban much practical value, given the expertise needed to operate and maintain them..."

"... defense analysts have said. Aircraft and aircraft components and parts could be worth more in the profits they would bring when sold on the secondary market.... Many of the seized U.S.-made small arms are likely to benefit related groups, such as Pakistani Taliban factions and militants and separatists in Kashmir and the Balochi region, said Matthew Henman, the head of terrorism and insurgency research at Janes, a defense-industry analyst. The most valuable items are Humvees and Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles, known as MRAPs, since they support existing Taliban patrols and require limited know-how and upkeep. But some of the defense analysts said the abandoned weapons don’t provide the Taliban with an advantage over U.S. forces. 'These seizures have more propaganda value for the Taliban than any real leveling-up of capabilities,' Mr. Henman said."

From "Taliban Seize U.S. Weapons in Afghanistan, Stockpiling Helicopters, Guns and Trucks/After collapse of Afghanistan’s U.S.-supported military, grenade launchers, missiles and aircraft are now wielded by militants" (Wall Street Journal).