Jars, not restrooms, because, hey, it’s capitalism and low wage workers aren’t really human anyway

In a more optimistic moment, I succumbed to sentiment—I’ve been doing a lot of that lately—and ordered graduation regalia meant to conform to that I wore to my Ph.D. graduation five years ago (figure 1).

Fig. 1. Photograph by author, March 26, 2021.

And today, since I am home anyway, anticipating side effects from the second shot of the Pfizer vaccine for COVID-19 that have yet to seriously materialize,[1] I put together the resulting assemblage and took a photograph (figure 1).

It does not, in all particulars, conform to my recollection. But first, I suspect the database the vendor I ordered this from might have more faithful information recorded than my dim recollection or, perhaps, to a Saybrook University standard more faithful to its history than what has transpired since its absorption into The Chicago School Educational Services; and second, I’m not sure how much it really matters.

If I ever find my way back into academia, there are ceremonial occasions where this regalia could be appropriate.


Pandemic

There is a new blog post entitled, “Medical apartheid and COVID-19 vaccinations.”

I did receive the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine today. My symptoms have, overall, been milder than with the first shot. But I’ve been a bit light-headed, headachy in a way that makes me glad I decided to stay home, with the sort of medicine that in Pennsylvania one needs a card for.

I previously said I’d worn the second mask my mother made for me to the first shot. This was incorrect; it was actually the first. So today, I pulled the second mask out of sequence to wear it for the second shot. (At the end of each day, I boil the mask I’ve worn that day, so there’s really no risk to doing this.)

It will be harder to tell which was the third mask when it comes time for a “booster” for variants that are further enabled by vaccine hesitancy and resistance.[2] From the third mask on, my mother went to a Scot/Irish plaid fabric which I find attractive, but where I can remember which of the first two (brown) masks is which, I’ve completely lost track of which plaid mask is which, except for the last, which is of a significantly different design. I’ve also had to set two masks aside, one because it tended to rest on the tip of my nose rather than covering the bridge as needed, and the other because it seemed just a tad too small. It’s entirely conceivable that one of the latter masks was the third.

The notifications I’m receiving from the Allegheny Health Department suggest to me that we’re having another surge of COVID-19 cases in the county. My vaccination will supposedly not be fully effective for two weeks,[3] that is, until April 9. (Yes, of course, I’ve marked the date.)

April Dembosky, “It’s not Tuskegee. Current medical racism fuels Black Americans’ vaccine hesitancy,” Los Angeles Times, March 25, 2021, https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2021-03-25/current-medical-racism-not-tuskegee-expls-vaccine-hesitancy-among-black-americans


Amazon


Fig. 2. Amazon Logistics email, image via the Intercept,[4] March 25, 2021, fair use.

I keep TravelJohn products in my car because as an Uber/Lyft driver, it’s often hard to stop at a restroom. The downside is that I need to find a trash can about five minutes after use, when they are safe to dispose; these bags do not seal on top.


I’m sorry that Jeff Bezos, the Jean-Luc Picard-wannabe,[5] can’t imagine that he’s this inhumane.[6] But he is. And such inhumanity is pretty much standard operating procedure for low-wage work under capitalism now.[7]

Ken Klippenstein, “Documents Show Amazon Is Aware Drivers Pee in Bottles and Even Defecate En Route, Despite Company Denial,” Intercept, March 25, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/03/25/amazon-drivers-pee-bottles-union/

Matt Stieb, “Amazon Called Out for Denying Workers Go to Bathroom in Bottles,” New York, March 25, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/amazon-called-out-for-denying-that-workers-pee-in-bottles.html



  1. [1]Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Possible Side Effects After Getting a COVID-19 Vaccine,” March 16, 2021, https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/expect/after.html
  2. [2]Melissa Healy, “California’s coronavirus strain looks increasingly dangerous: ‘The devil is already here,’” Los Angeles Times, February 23, 2021, https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2021-02-23/california-homegrown-coronavirus-strain-looks-increasingly-transmissible-and-dangerous; Christopher Rowland, Emily Rauhala, and Miriam Berger, “Drug companies defend vaccine monopolies in face of global outcry,” Washington Post, March 20, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/20/covid-vaccine-global-shortages/; Benjamin Wallace-Wells, “The Vaccine Resisters,” New Yorker, March 5, 2021, https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-populism/the-vaccine-resisters
  3. [3]Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “When You’ve Been Fully Vaccinated,” March 23, 2021, https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/fully-vaccinated.html
  4. [4]Ken Klippenstein, “Documents Show Amazon Is Aware Drivers Pee in Bottles and Even Defecate En Route, Despite Company Denial,” Intercept, March 25, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/03/25/amazon-drivers-pee-bottles-union/
  5. [5]Franklin Foer, “Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan,” Atlantic, November 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/11/what-jeff-bezos-wants/598363/
  6. [6]Matt Stieb, “Amazon Called Out for Denying Workers Go to Bathroom in Bottles,” New York, March 25, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/amazon-called-out-for-denying-that-workers-pee-in-bottles.html
  7. [7]David Benfell, “Time for the gig economy to grow up,” Not Housebroken, August 30, 2019, https://disunitedstates.org/2019/08/30/time-for-the-gig-economy-to-grow-up/; David Benfell, “The expendable worker,” Not Housebroken, July 5, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/07/05/the-expendable-worker/; David Benfell, “A piper needs paying,” Not Housebroken, January 29, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/12/19/a-piper-needs-paying/; Johana Bhuiyan, “Amazon ends practice of dipping into drivers’ tips to meet their wage guarantees,” Los Angeles Times, August 22, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2019-08-22/amazon-flex-fares-tips; Jessa Crispin, “Amazon is a disaster for workers. Nomadland glosses over that,” Guardian, March 23, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/23/amazon-nomadland-film-jeff-bezos-disaster-workers; Daniel D’Addario, “Amazon is worse than Walmart,” Salon, July 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/control/2013/07/30/how_amazon_is_worse_than_wal_mart/; Timothy Egan, “The Corporate Daddy,” New York Times, June 19, 2014, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/20/opinion/timothy-egan-walmart-starbucks-and-the-fight-against-inequality.html; Josh Eidelson, “Wal-Mart faces warehouse horror allegations and federal Labor Board complaint,” Salon, November 19, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/11/18/breaking_wal_mart_faces_warehouse_horror_allegations_and_federal_labor_board_complaint/; Josh Eidelson, “Tens of thousands protest, over 100 arrested in Black Friday challenge to Wal-Mart,” Salon, November 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/11/30/tens_of_thousands_protest_over_100_arrested_in_black_friday_challenge_to_wal_mart/; Josh Eidelson, “Finally paying for Wal-Mart’s sins: Wage theft settlement yields millions,” Salon, December 16, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/12/16/finally_paying_for_wal_marts_sins_wage_theft_settlement_yields_millions/; Josh Eidelson, “Freezing for Wal-Mart: Sub-zero warehouse temperatures spur Indiana work stoppage,” Salon, January 14, 2014, https://www.salon.com/test/2014/01/13/freezing_for_wal_mart_sub_zero_warehouse_temperatures_spur_indiana_work_stoppage/; Josh Eidelson, “Amazon Keeps Unions Out By Keeping Workers in Fear, Says Organizer,” Alternet, January 22, 2014, https://www.alternet.org/2014/01/amazon-keeps-unions-out-keeping-workers-fear-says-organizer/; Nichole Gracely, “‘Being homeless is better than working for Amazon,’” Guardian, November 28, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/nov/28/being-homeless-is-better-than-working-for-amazon; Steven Greenhouse, “The Changing Face of Temporary Employment,” New York Times, August 31, 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/01/upshot/the-changing-face-of-temporary-employment.html; Erin Hatton, “The Rise of the Permanent Temp Economy,” New York Times, January 26, 2013, http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/26/the-rise-of-the-permanent-temp-economy/; Simon Head, “Worse than Wal-Mart: Amazon’s sick brutality and secret history of ruthlessly intimidating workers,” Salon, February 23, 2014, https://www.salon.com/control/2014/02/23/worse_than_wal_mart_amazons_sick_brutality_and_secret_history_of_ruthlessly_intimidating_workers/; Paul Jaskunas, “The Tyranny of the Forced Smile,” New York Times, February 14, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/jobs/the-tyranny-of-the-forced-smile.html; Allison Kilkenny, “Ohio Walmart Holds Food Drive For Its Own Employees,” Nation, November 18, 2013, https://www.thenation.com/article/ohio-walmart-holds-food-drive-its-own-employees/; Ken Klippenstein, “Documents Show Amazon Is Aware Drivers Pee in Bottles and Even Defecate En Route, Despite Company Denial,” Intercept, March 25, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/03/25/amazon-drivers-pee-bottles-union/; Paul Krugman, “The Plight of the Employed,” New York Times, December 24, 2013, http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/24/the-plight-of-the-employed/; Paul Krugman, “The Fear Economy,” New York Times, December 26, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/27/opinion/krugman-the-fear-economy.html; Danielle Kurtzleben, “Read McDonald’s workers’ shocking harassment and discrimination complaints — and why they’re so important,” Vox, January 22, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/1/22/7873661/mcdonalds-lawsuit-harassment-discrimination; Colin Lecher, “How Amazon automatically tracks and fires warehouse workers for ‘productivity,’” Verge, April 25, 2019, https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/25/18516004/amazon-warehouse-fulfillment-centers-productivity-firing-terminations; Edward McClelland, “You call this a middle class? “I’m trying not to lose my house,’” Salon, March 1, 2014, https://www.salon.com/test/2014/03/01/you_call_this_a_middle_class_i%E2%80%99m_trying_not_to_lose_my_house/; Mac McClelland, “I Was a Warehouse Wage Slave,” Mother Jones, March/April 2012, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/02/mac-mcclelland-free-online-shipping-warehouses-labor/; Patrick McGreevy and Suhauna Hussain, “California demands that Amazon comply with COVID-19 investigation,” Los Angeles Times, December 14, 2020, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-14/california-lawsuit-amazon-workplace-conditions-covid-19; Nathaniel Mott, “From Amazon warehouse workers to Google bus drivers, it’s tough working a non-tech job at a tech company,” Pando, October 9, 2014, https://pando.com/2014/10/09/from-amazon-warehouse-workers-to-google-bus-drivers-its-tough-working-a-non-tech-job-at-a-tech-company/; Ari Rabin-Havt, “Wal-Mart flunks its fact-check: The truth behind its sarcastic response to the Times,” Salon, June 25, 2014, https://www.salon.com/control/2014/06/25/walmart_flunks_its_fact_check_the_truth_behind_its_sarcastic_response_to_the_times/; José Rodríguez, Jr., “The Aftermath Of Prop 22 Is Not As Happy As Big Tech Promised,” Jalopnik, February 18, 2021, https://jalopnik.com/the-aftermath-of-prop-22-is-not-as-happy-as-big-tech-pr-1846299686; Lia Russell, “The Silicon Valley Economy Is Here. And It’s a Nightmare,” New Republic, January 16, 2020, https://newrepublic.com/article/156202/silicon-valley-economy-here-its-nightmare; Michael Sainato, “‘I’m not a robot’: Amazon workers condemn unsafe, grueling conditions at warehouse,” Guardian, February 5, 2020, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/feb/05/amazon-workers-protest-unsafe-grueling-conditions-warehouse; Alexander Sammon, “Prop 22 Is Here, and It’s Already Worse Than Expected,” American Prospect, January 15, 2021, https://prospect.org/labor/prop-22-is-here-already-worse-than-expected-california-gig-workers/; Alex Seitz-Wald, “Amazon is everything wrong with our new economy,” Salon, July 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/07/30/amazon_is_everything_wrong_with_our_new_economy/; Alana Semuels, “As employers push efficiency, the daily grind wears down workers,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-harsh-work-20130407-story.html; Alana Semuels, “How the relationship between employers and workers changed,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2013-apr-07-la-fi-mo-harsh-work-history-20130405-story.html; Alana Semuels, “Tougher workplace makes home life worse too,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2013-apr-07-la-fi-mo-harsh-work-history-20130405-story.html; Faiz Siddiqui and Andrew Van Dam, “As Uber avoided paying into unemployment, the federal government helped thousands of its drivers weather the pandemic,” Washington Post, March 16, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/03/16/uber-lyft-unemployment-benefits/; Spencer Soper, “Inside Amazon’s Warehouse,” Lehigh Valley Morning Call, September 18, 2011, https://www.mcall.com/business/mc-xpm-2011-09-18-mc-allentown-amazon-complaints-20110917-story.html; Matt Stieb, “Amazon Called Out for Denying Workers Go to Bathroom in Bottles,” New York, March 25, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/amazon-called-out-for-denying-that-workers-pee-in-bottles.html; Lindsay Wise, “Report: Temp jobs at all-time high in U.S.,” McClatchy, September 2, 2014, https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/economy/article24772543.html

The ongoing battle against (self-)hate speech

Filibuster

Sarah Binder, “Mitch McConnell is wrong. Here’s the filibuster’s ‘racial history,’” Washington Post, March 24, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/03/24/mitch-mcconnell-is-wrong-heres-filibusters-racial-history/


(c)Rap and Hip Hop

Since the last version of the sign I posted for my Uber and Lyft passengers, I’ve now heard the n-word twice and the words ‘bitch’ and ‘ho’ not at all. The tone in the car is markedly improved.

Fig. 1. Latest version of sign produced by author, March 25, 2021.

But I think they don’t like it. My Uber driver ratings continue to decline (down to 4.88, as of this morning, supposedly based on the last 500 passengers), even though I haven’t been playing my music with passengers in the car. That may also be due to the prohibition on eating. So I’ve added the shaming final bullet point, because all the comments I’ve heard from passengers have been positive, some remarking that all this is “common sense,” many expressing dismay that any of this is even a problem.

For some reason, however, Uber still has me marked as having high ratings. I thought the line for that was 4.90. So I guess I have no idea how they’re assessing that.


Endless evil

Amazon

I just don’t even know what to say about working for Amazon anymore. They are an important aspect of the entirely underappreciated evil of low-wage and gig work that has gone on for years,[1] that the world seems to think is just fine for us to endure, just fine for me to endure.

Jessa Crispin, “Amazon is a disaster for workers. Nomadland glosses over that,” Guardian, March 23, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/23/amazon-nomadland-film-jeff-bezos-disaster-workers


Guns


Regrettably, it’s time, yet again, to highlight a couple of old blog posts:


  1. [1]David Benfell, “Time for the gig economy to grow up,” Not Housebroken, August 30, 2019, https://disunitedstates.org/2019/08/30/time-for-the-gig-economy-to-grow-up/; David Benfell, “The expendable worker,” Not Housebroken, July 5, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/07/05/the-expendable-worker/; Johana Bhuiyan, “Amazon ends practice of dipping into drivers’ tips to meet their wage guarantees,” Los Angeles Times, August 22, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2019-08-22/amazon-flex-fares-tips; Jessa Crispin, “Amazon is a disaster for workers. Nomadland glosses over that,” Guardian, March 23, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/23/amazon-nomadland-film-jeff-bezos-disaster-workers; Daniel D’Addario, “Amazon is worse than Walmart,” Salon, July 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/control/2013/07/30/how_amazon_is_worse_than_wal_mart/; Timothy Egan, “The Corporate Daddy,” New York Times, June 19, 2014, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/20/opinion/timothy-egan-walmart-starbucks-and-the-fight-against-inequality.html; Josh Eidelson, “Wal-Mart faces warehouse horror allegations and federal Labor Board complaint,” Salon, November 19, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/11/18/breaking_wal_mart_faces_warehouse_horror_allegations_and_federal_labor_board_complaint/; Josh Eidelson, “Tens of thousands protest, over 100 arrested in Black Friday challenge to Wal-Mart,” Salon, November 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/11/30/tens_of_thousands_protest_over_100_arrested_in_black_friday_challenge_to_wal_mart/; Josh Eidelson, “Finally paying for Wal-Mart’s sins: Wage theft settlement yields millions,” Salon, December 16, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/12/16/finally_paying_for_wal_marts_sins_wage_theft_settlement_yields_millions/; Josh Eidelson, “Freezing for Wal-Mart: Sub-zero warehouse temperatures spur Indiana work stoppage,” Salon, January 14, 2014, https://www.salon.com/test/2014/01/13/freezing_for_wal_mart_sub_zero_warehouse_temperatures_spur_indiana_work_stoppage/; Josh Eidelson, “Amazon Keeps Unions Out By Keeping Workers in Fear, Says Organizer,” Alternet, January 22, 2014, https://www.alternet.org/2014/01/amazon-keeps-unions-out-keeping-workers-fear-says-organizer/; Nichole Gracely, “‘Being homeless is better than working for Amazon,’” Guardian, November 28, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/money/2014/nov/28/being-homeless-is-better-than-working-for-amazon; Steven Greenhouse, “The Changing Face of Temporary Employment,” New York Times, August 31, 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/01/upshot/the-changing-face-of-temporary-employment.html; Erin Hatton, “The Rise of the Permanent Temp Economy,” New York Times, January 26, 2013, http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/26/the-rise-of-the-permanent-temp-economy/; Simon Head, “Worse than Wal-Mart: Amazon’s sick brutality and secret history of ruthlessly intimidating workers,” Salon, February 23, 2014, https://www.salon.com/control/2014/02/23/worse_than_wal_mart_amazons_sick_brutality_and_secret_history_of_ruthlessly_intimidating_workers/; Paul Jaskunas, “The Tyranny of the Forced Smile,” New York Times, February 14, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/jobs/the-tyranny-of-the-forced-smile.html; Allison Kilkenny, “Ohio Walmart Holds Food Drive For Its Own Employees,” Nation, November 18, 2013, https://www.thenation.com/article/ohio-walmart-holds-food-drive-its-own-employees/; Paul Krugman, “The Plight of the Employed,” New York Times, December 24, 2013, http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/24/the-plight-of-the-employed/; Paul Krugman, “The Fear Economy,” New York Times, December 26, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/27/opinion/krugman-the-fear-economy.html; Danielle Kurtzleben, “Read McDonald’s workers’ shocking harassment and discrimination complaints — and why they’re so important,” Vox, January 22, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/1/22/7873661/mcdonalds-lawsuit-harassment-discrimination; Colin Lecher, “How Amazon automatically tracks and fires warehouse workers for ‘productivity,’” Verge, April 25, 2019, https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/25/18516004/amazon-warehouse-fulfillment-centers-productivity-firing-terminations; Edward McClelland, “You call this a middle class? “I’m trying not to lose my house,’” Salon, March 1, 2014, https://www.salon.com/test/2014/03/01/you_call_this_a_middle_class_i%E2%80%99m_trying_not_to_lose_my_house/; Mac McClelland, “I Was a Warehouse Wage Slave,” Mother Jones, March/April 2012, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/02/mac-mcclelland-free-online-shipping-warehouses-labor/; Patrick McGreevy and Suhauna Hussain, “California demands that Amazon comply with COVID-19 investigation,” Los Angeles Times, December 14, 2020, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-14/california-lawsuit-amazon-workplace-conditions-covid-19; Nathaniel Mott, “From Amazon warehouse workers to Google bus drivers, it’s tough working a non-tech job at a tech company,” Pando, October 9, 2014, https://pando.com/2014/10/09/from-amazon-warehouse-workers-to-google-bus-drivers-its-tough-working-a-non-tech-job-at-a-tech-company/; Ari Rabin-Havt, “Wal-Mart flunks its fact-check: The truth behind its sarcastic response to the Times,” Salon, June 25, 2014, https://www.salon.com/control/2014/06/25/walmart_flunks_its_fact_check_the_truth_behind_its_sarcastic_response_to_the_times/; José Rodríguez, Jr., “The Aftermath Of Prop 22 Is Not As Happy As Big Tech Promised,” Jalopnik, February 18, 2021, https://jalopnik.com/the-aftermath-of-prop-22-is-not-as-happy-as-big-tech-pr-1846299686; Lia Russell, “The Silicon Valley Economy Is Here. And It’s a Nightmare,” New Republic, January 16, 2020, https://newrepublic.com/article/156202/silicon-valley-economy-here-its-nightmare; Michael Sainato, “‘I’m not a robot’: Amazon workers condemn unsafe, grueling conditions at warehouse,” Guardian, February 5, 2020, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/feb/05/amazon-workers-protest-unsafe-grueling-conditions-warehouse; Alexander Sammon, “Prop 22 Is Here, and It’s Already Worse Than Expected,” American Prospect, January 15, 2021, https://prospect.org/labor/prop-22-is-here-already-worse-than-expected-california-gig-workers/; Alex Seitz-Wald, “Amazon is everything wrong with our new economy,” Salon, July 30, 2013, https://www.salon.com/test/2013/07/30/amazon_is_everything_wrong_with_our_new_economy/; Alana Semuels, “As employers push efficiency, the daily grind wears down workers,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-harsh-work-20130407-story.html; Alana Semuels, “How the relationship between employers and workers changed,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2013-apr-07-la-fi-mo-harsh-work-history-20130405-story.html; Alana Semuels, “Tougher workplace makes home life worse too,” Los Angeles Times, April 7, 2013, https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2013-apr-07-la-fi-mo-harsh-work-history-20130405-story.html; Faiz Siddiqui and Andrew Van Dam, “As Uber avoided paying into unemployment, the federal government helped thousands of its drivers weather the pandemic,” Washington Post, March 16, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/03/16/uber-lyft-unemployment-benefits/; Spencer Soper, “Inside Amazon’s Warehouse,” Lehigh Valley Morning Call, September 18, 2011, https://www.mcall.com/business/mc-xpm-2011-09-18-mc-allentown-amazon-complaints-20110917-story.html; Lindsay Wise, “Report: Temp jobs at all-time high in U.S.,” McClatchy, September 2, 2014, https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/economy/article24772543.html

No cheaper rent for me

San Francisco

There is a new blog post entitled, “San Francisco’s political establishment doth protest too much.”

Jill Tucker, “Mayor Breed calls for S.F. school board member to resign over racist tweets directed at Asian Americans,” San Francisco Chronicle, March 21, 2021, https://www.sfchronicle.com/education/article/Mayor-Breed-calls-for-S-F-school-board-member-to-16040970.php


Housing

It looks like I’m going to have to delay my apartment hunt. Catherine Rampell’s article is certainly bad news[1] but the real reason is a tax bill that’s more than double what I expected. I just don’t see being able to swing a move right now. It’s unfortunate: I turn 62 on April 29, making me eligible for senior housing that I was hoping would mean cheaper rent.

Catherine Rampell, “Rents for the rich are plummeting. Rents for the poor are rising. Why?” Washington Post, March 22, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/22/rents-rich-are-plummeting-rents-poor-are-rising-why/


  1. [1]Catherine Rampell, “Rents for the rich are plummeting. Rents for the poor are rising. Why?” Washington Post, March 22, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/03/22/rents-rich-are-plummeting-rents-poor-are-rising-why/

Yet another way capitalism kills

Pandemic

There is a new blog post entitled, “The lethal dishonesty of ‘intellectual property’ in a pandemic.” The whole issue of intellectual property claims on vaccines[1] hadn’t even occurred to me when I wrote “The capitalist death cult.” But gee, here it is.

Christopher Rowland, Emily Rauhala, and Miriam Berger, “Drug companies defend vaccine monopolies in face of global outcry,” Washington Post, March 20, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/20/covid-vaccine-global-shortages/


  1. [1]Christopher Rowland, Emily Rauhala, and Miriam Berger, “Drug companies defend vaccine monopolies in face of global outcry,” Washington Post, March 20, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/20/covid-vaccine-global-shortages/

Bumbling to defend neoliberalism (Update #4)

Updates

  1. Originally published, March 19, 11:05 pm.

  2. March 20, 2021, 10:18 am:

    • [T]wo years ago, angling for the White House herself, [Kamala] Harris, then a senator from California, joked about smoking pot.

      “I have … and I did inhale,” she told the hosts of The Breakfast Club about smoking in college. “It was a long time ago … I think it gives a lot of people joy and we need more joy.”[1]

      But Joe Biden fired five White House staffers for marijuana use and, even as Congress moves toward legalization, apparently wants to keep marijuana criminalized (as shifting the drug from Schedule I to Schedule II would do). And his now-vice president has walked back her support for legalization.[2]

      We might recall that criminalization of marijuana is all about racism.[3]

    • The Guardian, also from Britain, has also picked up the story of Joe Biden’s stumble climbing the stairs to Air Force One.[4] So it’s no longer just the Telegraph.[5]

      That said, I’ll start looking at political ramifications[6] when and if U.S. papers pick up the story. Um, I’m waiting. . . .

  3. March 20, 2021, 11:23 am:

    • The story of Joe Biden’s stumble seems increasingly to be an international but not a domestic story. Agence France-Presse picked it up and the Times of Israel published it.[7]

      There are a couple of issues here. First, that of Biden’s age, mentioned in every story I’ve seen on this, as he is the oldest president ever to take office. Both the Telegraph and Guardian raised arguably ageist questions of Biden’s fitness for office.[8] If we are going to suggest that a stumble on what seems to be a problematic set of stairs[9]—and I’d like to know what makes them problematic—reflects Biden’s physical capacity, we also need a clear line of argument as to how this affects his mental capacity.[10]

      But second is the question of that discrepancy between U.S. and international coverage, suggesting a domestic bias favoring Biden. This needs to be watched.

  4. March 20, 2021, 9:56 pm:

    • I wound up taking someone to Erie today. It was a lovely day for the drive, as clear as Pennsylvania ever gets. Spring hasn’t really sprung yet, but there were trees on both sides of Interstate 79 most of the way up.

      There were also reminders that this was Donald Trump country as, notably, I saw an old freight trailer parked with its side facing the freeway and festooned with campaign posters.

      As I crossed Interstate 90, I remembered the last time I was at this interchange, approaching from the west. I saw the sign for Pittsburgh and felt a tug.

      I pressed on to western Massachusetts, not yet realizing that the housing situation there would not work out.

      I didn’t cover much of Erie but one thing I noticed immediately was the condition of its roads. This was remarkably good. I did get a short ride while I was there with a passenger who said nothing about my sign but spent most of the ride studying it. Her appreciation was reflected in a ludicrously generous tip.

      Erie is a small town. It really doesn’t have the population for me to consider moving up there as an Uber/Lyft driver. But I was thinking about it.

      Once again, though, this was really a losing day. I deadheaded most of the way back. The way Uber pays for rides, trips that are mostly freeway miles really don’t pay as well as local rides on surface streets. That makes trips like this a bad deal.

      At least on that return trip, I could listen to my damned music.


Joe Biden

Apparently there really is a problem with the boarding stairs for Air Force One. But Joe Biden is, apparently, the first to stumble three times on a single ascent.[11] I’m not seeing this covered anywhere except in the Telegraph, so the paper’s pundit rush to explore political consequences[12] might be overstated.

Agence France-Presse, “Biden stumbles several times while boarding Air Force One,” Times of Israel, March 19, 2021, https://www.timesofisrael.com/biden-stumbles-several-times-while-boarding-air-force-one/

Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/

Natalie Fertig and Mona Zhang, “Same old Joe: Rebuffing staff who smoked pot fits Biden’s MO,” Politico, March 19, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/03/19/same-old-joe-rebuffing-staff-who-smoked-pot-fits-bidens-mo-477283

David Smith, “Biden ‘doing fine’ after stumbling once, twice, thrice on steps of Air Force One,” Guardian, March 19, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/19/joe-biden-fall-stumble-air-force-one


Filibuster

So what we’re really seeing here is that even if—and though the article stops short of saying so, this is the most likely scenario—the filibuster is reverted to an earlier form in which senators actually had to hold the floor, Republicans would still be able to provide the Democrats with an excuse for not getting anything done.[13]

Osita Nwanevu, “Republicans Know They’re Losing the Filibuster Fight,” New Republic, March 19, 2021, https://newrepublic.com/article/161765/republicans-losing-filibuster-fight-mcconnell


N-word

It’s early yet but, since I put the new sign (figure 1) up, I’ve heard the n-word precisely once in my car and I haven’t heard women called ‘bitches’ or ‘ho’s’ once. You might notice, in figure 1, that I don’t specify what words I’m talking about. But if my hypothesis holds, they know and they know damned well.

Fig. 1. Sign for Uber and Lyft passengers in author’s car, created by author, March 18, 2021.

Cross your fingers.


  1. [1]Natalie Fertig and Mona Zhang, “Same old Joe: Rebuffing staff who smoked pot fits Biden’s MO,” Politico, March 19, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/03/19/same-old-joe-rebuffing-staff-who-smoked-pot-fits-bidens-mo-477283
  2. [2]Natalie Fertig and Mona Zhang, “Same old Joe: Rebuffing staff who smoked pot fits Biden’s MO,” Politico, March 19, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/03/19/same-old-joe-rebuffing-staff-who-smoked-pot-fits-bidens-mo-477283
  3. [3]John Hudak, “Marijuana’s racist history shows the need for comprehensive drug reform,” Brookings, June 23, 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/06/23/marijuanas-racist-history-shows-the-need-for-comprehensive-drug-reform/
  4. [4]David Smith, “Biden ‘doing fine’ after stumbling once, twice, thrice on steps of Air Force One,” Guardian, March 19, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/19/joe-biden-fall-stumble-air-force-one
  5. [5]Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/
  6. [6]Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/
  7. [7]Agence France-Presse, “Biden stumbles several times while boarding Air Force One,” Times of Israel, March 19, 2021, https://www.timesofisrael.com/biden-stumbles-several-times-while-boarding-air-force-one/
  8. [8]Agence France-Presse, “Biden stumbles several times while boarding Air Force One,” Times of Israel, March 19, 2021, https://www.timesofisrael.com/biden-stumbles-several-times-while-boarding-air-force-one/; Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/; David Smith, “Biden ‘doing fine’ after stumbling once, twice, thrice on steps of Air Force One,” Guardian, March 19, 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/19/joe-biden-fall-stumble-air-force-one
  9. [9]Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/
  10. [10]Such a link is not altogether absent. The distinction I raise is, on a higher level, that between mind and body, which seems not really to exist: Almerindo E. Ojeda, ed., The Trauma of Psychological Torture (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2008); George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Philosophy in the Flesh (New York: Basic, 1999). But the suggestion that a diminishment of one capacity, climbing stairs, indicates diminishment of cognitive capacity seems a stretch, possibly an ecological fallacy.
  11. [11]Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/
  12. [12]Josie Ensor and Nick Allen, “Joe Biden trips and falls three times boarding Air Force One,” Telegraph, March 19, 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/03/19/joe-biden-trips-stumbles-three-times-boarding-air-force-one/
  13. [13]Osita Nwanevu, “Republicans Know They’re Losing the Filibuster Fight,” New Republic, March 19, 2021, https://newrepublic.com/article/161765/republicans-losing-filibuster-fight-mcconnell

The expensive improvisation (Update #4)

Updates

  1. Originally published, March 17, 2021, at 11:54 pm.

  2. March 18, 2021, 10:37 am:

  3. March 18, 2021, 6:25 pm:

    • So the Verizon technician showed up, did a few trips to and fro, then I heard the whirring sound of an electric screwdriver. I seem to have a new gadget in my closet. And my home Internet is back up.

      I had some catching up to do on stuff I couldn’t do while the home network was down, even with the MiFi, which, by the way, seems to have a very short WiFi coverage area, but this is done now.

  4. March 19, 2021, 12:14 pm:


So it’s a good thing there wasn’t actually any news today. See these two red lights in my closet (figure 2)?

Fig. 2. Verizon FiOS gadget—they call it an ONT—in my closet. Photograph by author, March 17, 2021.

They’re supposed to be green and not just because it’s Saint Patrick’s Day. They aren’t. My home Internet is down.

I grabbed a MiFi unit from my car but, for some reason, my desktop system, a Mac, won’t really connect to it. It says it does, but it doesn’t.

So I’ve got my PixelBook out. It connects just fine. Which is good because me and my fat fingers just ain’t so hot on that phone.

Hopefully, the Verizon guy comes tomorrow. It appears the unit pictured in figure 1 has died.

Basically, Verizon FiOS has been pretty solid for the nearly two years I’ve been here. This is the first significant outage.


My car passed inspection today. This time the surprise bill was only $400. Last year, it was $1,800. But the $400 this time doesn’t count the $1,900 worth of work I had done early in February. Then, of course, there’s the $80 I spent on Uber and Lyft rides while today’s work was being done.

I also got my taxes sent off to be done and served as a participant in three research projects.


Donald Trump didn’t say, ‘Find the fraud.’ But he might as well have.

‘Latinx’

There is a new blog post entitled, “On ‘Latinx.’

Fernanda Zamudio-Suarez, “What Does ‘Latinx’ Mean?” Chronicle of Higher Education, March 16, 2021, https://www.chronicle.com/newsletter/race-on-campus/2021-03-16


Ridesharing

Uber and Lyft drivers were eligible for Paycheck Protection Program loans as part of the economic relief program for the pandemic. Many took advantage. Many did not, due to lack of information.[1] I fall into the latter group. It all seemed too weird and I was keeping busy anyway, raising doubt as to whether the program was even appropriate for me, albeit driving my aging (as of this morning, it has 260,785 miles on the odometer) 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid many, many more miles, often uncompensated miles between rides, on abysmal Pittsburgh roads, which has raised my maintenance costs completely out of proportion to the income I’m pulling in. The margins doing this are already tight, less than minimum wage, and this has made them tighter.[2]

I am wondering how many more miles like this I can put on my car. I am also more than a little disturbed by the prospect of buying another car, just to destroy it, like I am this one, doing a job I despise, all because I can’t get a real one.[3]

But meanwhile, Uber and Lyft continued to evade paying into unemployment programs and offered, at best, limited alternatives of their own for drivers compelled to quarantine.[4] It’s an example of corporate welfare for companies that will likely never be profitable[5] while their executives pull in outrageous compensation.

It’s bad enough that, even with a Ph.D., I can’t get a real job.[6] But the discrepancy between how I am treated and how the executives of these money-losing,[7] abusive[8] companies are treated is all the more galling.

Faiz Siddiqui and Andrew Van Dam, “As Uber avoided paying into unemployment, the federal government helped thousands of its drivers weather the pandemic,” Washington Post, March 16, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/03/16/uber-lyft-unemployment-benefits/


Donald Trump

The Washington Post has corrected a story in which the paper misquoted Donald Trump in a phone call pressuring a Georgia elections investigator:[9]

Correction: Two months after publication of this story, the Georgia secretary of state released an audio recording of President Donald Trump’s December phone call with the state’s top elections investigator. The recording revealed that The Post misquoted Trump’s comments on the call, based on information provided by a source. Trump did not tell the investigator to “find the fraud” or say she would be “a national hero” if she did so. Instead, Trump urged the investigator to scrutinize ballots in Fulton County, Ga., asserting she would find “dishonesty” there. He also told her that she had “the most important job in the country right now.” A story about the recording can be found here. The headline and text of this story have been corrected to remove quotes misattributed to Trump.[10]

This article was likely cited in this space.

Amy Gardner, “Trump pressured a Georgia elections investigator in a separate call legal experts say could amount to obstruction,” Washington Post, March 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-call-georgia-investigator/2021/01/09/7a55c7fa-51cf-11eb-83e3-322644d82356_story.html


  1. [1]Faiz Siddiqui and Andrew Van Dam, “As Uber avoided paying into unemployment, the federal government helped thousands of its drivers weather the pandemic,” Washington Post, March 16, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/03/16/uber-lyft-unemployment-benefits/
  2. [2]David Benfell, “Tax time,” Not Housebroken, July 14, 2020, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/07/14/tax-time/
  3. [3]David Benfell, “About my job hunt,” Not Housebroken, n.d., https://disunitedstates.org/about-my-job-hunt/
  4. [4]Faiz Siddiqui and Andrew Van Dam, “As Uber avoided paying into unemployment, the federal government helped thousands of its drivers weather the pandemic,” Washington Post, March 16, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/03/16/uber-lyft-unemployment-benefits/
  5. [5]Rich Alton, “Basic economics means Uber and Lyft can’t rely on driverless cars to become profitable,” MarketWatch, August 12, 2019, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/basic-economics-means-uber-and-lyft-cant-rely-on-driverless-cars-to-become-profitable-2019-08-12; Matthew Beedham, “Uber: Is this the beginning of the end for the ride-hailing Goliath?” Next Web, March 2, 2021, https://thenextweb.com/shift/2021/03/02/uber-is-this-the-beginning-of-the-end-for-the-ride-hailing-goliath/; Eliot Brown, “Uber Wants to Be the Uber of Everything—But Can It Make a Profit?” Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-wants-to-be-the-uber-of-everything-11556909866; Eliot Brown, “Uber Posts Its Largest Quarterly Loss,” Wall Street Journal, August 8, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-posts-its-largest-ever-quarterly-loss-11565295373; Megan Rose Dickey, “Uber lays off 435 people across engineering and product teams,” TechCrunch, September 10, 2019, https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/10/uber-lays-off-435-people-across-engineering-and-product-teams/; Richard Durant, “Uber’s Profitability Problem Is Structural,” Seeking Alpha, August 21, 2019, https://seekingalpha.com/article/4287055-ubers-profitability-problem-structural; Ryan Felton, “Uber Is Doomed,” Jalopnik, February 24, 2017, https://jalopnik.com/uber-is-doomed-1792634203; Laura Forman, “Uber, Lyft Face a No-Sharing Economy,” Wall Street Journal, October 26, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-lyft-face-a-no-sharing-economy-11603710180; Edward Helmore, “Will Uber ever make money? Day of reckoning looms for ride-sharing firm,” Guardian, August 4, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/aug/04/uber-ride-share-lyft-ipo-earnings; Kirsten Korosec, “Uber in talks to sell ATG self-driving unit to Aurora,” TechCrunch, November 13, 2020, https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/13/uber-in-talks-to-sell-atg-self-driving-unit-to-aurora/; Timothy B. Lee, “Uber, losing billions, freezes engineering hires,” Ars Technica, August 9, 2019, https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/08/uber-freezes-engineering-hires-amid-mounting-losses/; Megan McArdle, “Uber can’t keep bleeding money, can it? It apparently thinks it can,” Washington Post, November 5, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/uber-cant-keep-bleeding-money-can-it-it-apparently-thinks-it-can/2019/11/05/4aa4fec0-000b-11ea-8501-2a7123a38c58_story.html; Tom McKay, “Surprising No One, Uber Continues to Hemorrhage Cash,” Gizmodo, November 4, 2019, https://gizmodo.com/surprising-no-one-uber-continues-to-hemorrhage-cash-1839625062; Christopher Mims, “In a Tight Labor Market, Gig Workers Get Harder to Please,” Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-a-tight-labor-market-gig-workers-get-harder-to-please-11556942404; Patrick Howell O’Neill, “Just In Time For Its Big IPO, Uber Loses $1 Billion,” Gizmodo, April 26, 2019, https://gizmodo.com/just-in-time-for-its-big-ipo-uber-loses-1-billion-1834331980; Annie Palmer, “Uber falls to all-time low as investors grow more skeptical,” CNBC, August 12, 2019, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/12/uber-stock-falls-to-all-time-low-as-investors-grow-more-skeptical.html; Preetika Rana, “Uber Ridership Fails to Recover as Pandemic Drives Another Big Loss,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-ridership-fails-to-recover-as-pandemic-drives-another-big-loss-11596744389; Heather Somerville, “Uber Shedding About 350 Jobs to Shore Up Business,” Wall Street Journal, October 14, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-shedding-about-350-jobs-to-shore-up-business-11571092680; Heather Somerville, “Uber Booked Another Quarterly Loss as Revenue Climbed,” Wall Street Journal, November 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-booked-another-quarterly-loss-as-revenue-climbed-11572901549; Heather Somerville, “Uber Sells Self-Driving-Car Unit to Autonomous-Driving Startup,” Wall Street Journal, December 7, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-lyft-face-a-no-sharing-economy-11603710180; Heather Somerville and Mark Maurer, “Uber Cuts More Than 400 Technical Jobs,” Wall Street Journal, September 10, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-cuts-more-than-400-technical-jobs-11568144111; Georgia Wells, “Uber Cites Tight Competition After Posting $1 Billion Loss,” Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/ubers-first-quarter-loss-tops-1-billion-11559246846; Stephen Wilmot, “Uber’s Long Road to Profits,” Wall Street Journal, August 22, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/ubers-long-road-to-profits-11566471068; Julia Carrie Wong, “Disgruntled drivers and ‘cultural challenges’: Uber admits to its biggest risk factors,” Guardian, April 12, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/apr/11/uber-ipo-risk-factors; Michael Wursthorn, “Lyft Shares Rally on Hopes Price Increases Will Drive Profit,” Wall Street Journal, August 26, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/lyft-shares-rally-on-hopes-price-increases-will-drive-profits-11566845457
  6. [6]David Benfell, “About my job hunt,” Not Housebroken, n.d., https://disunitedstates.org/about-my-job-hunt/
  7. [7]Rich Alton, “Basic economics means Uber and Lyft can’t rely on driverless cars to become profitable,” MarketWatch, August 12, 2019, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/basic-economics-means-uber-and-lyft-cant-rely-on-driverless-cars-to-become-profitable-2019-08-12; Matthew Beedham, “Uber: Is this the beginning of the end for the ride-hailing Goliath?” Next Web, March 2, 2021, https://thenextweb.com/shift/2021/03/02/uber-is-this-the-beginning-of-the-end-for-the-ride-hailing-goliath/; Eliot Brown, “Uber Wants to Be the Uber of Everything—But Can It Make a Profit?” Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-wants-to-be-the-uber-of-everything-11556909866; Eliot Brown, “Uber Posts Its Largest Quarterly Loss,” Wall Street Journal, August 8, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-posts-its-largest-ever-quarterly-loss-11565295373; Megan Rose Dickey, “Uber lays off 435 people across engineering and product teams,” TechCrunch, September 10, 2019, https://techcrunch.com/2019/09/10/uber-lays-off-435-people-across-engineering-and-product-teams/; Richard Durant, “Uber’s Profitability Problem Is Structural,” Seeking Alpha, August 21, 2019, https://seekingalpha.com/article/4287055-ubers-profitability-problem-structural; Ryan Felton, “Uber Is Doomed,” Jalopnik, February 24, 2017, https://jalopnik.com/uber-is-doomed-1792634203; Laura Forman, “Uber, Lyft Face a No-Sharing Economy,” Wall Street Journal, October 26, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-lyft-face-a-no-sharing-economy-11603710180; Edward Helmore, “Will Uber ever make money? Day of reckoning looms for ride-sharing firm,” Guardian, August 4, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/aug/04/uber-ride-share-lyft-ipo-earnings; Kirsten Korosec, “Uber in talks to sell ATG self-driving unit to Aurora,” TechCrunch, November 13, 2020, https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/13/uber-in-talks-to-sell-atg-self-driving-unit-to-aurora/; Timothy B. Lee, “Uber, losing billions, freezes engineering hires,” Ars Technica, August 9, 2019, https://arstechnica.com/cars/2019/08/uber-freezes-engineering-hires-amid-mounting-losses/; Megan McArdle, “Uber can’t keep bleeding money, can it? It apparently thinks it can,” Washington Post, November 5, 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/uber-cant-keep-bleeding-money-can-it-it-apparently-thinks-it-can/2019/11/05/4aa4fec0-000b-11ea-8501-2a7123a38c58_story.html; Tom McKay, “Surprising No One, Uber Continues to Hemorrhage Cash,” Gizmodo, November 4, 2019, https://gizmodo.com/surprising-no-one-uber-continues-to-hemorrhage-cash-1839625062; Christopher Mims, “In a Tight Labor Market, Gig Workers Get Harder to Please,” Wall Street Journal, May 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-a-tight-labor-market-gig-workers-get-harder-to-please-11556942404; Patrick Howell O’Neill, “Just In Time For Its Big IPO, Uber Loses $1 Billion,” Gizmodo, April 26, 2019, https://gizmodo.com/just-in-time-for-its-big-ipo-uber-loses-1-billion-1834331980; Annie Palmer, “Uber falls to all-time low as investors grow more skeptical,” CNBC, August 12, 2019, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/12/uber-stock-falls-to-all-time-low-as-investors-grow-more-skeptical.html; Preetika Rana, “Uber Ridership Fails to Recover as Pandemic Drives Another Big Loss,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-ridership-fails-to-recover-as-pandemic-drives-another-big-loss-11596744389; Heather Somerville, “Uber Shedding About 350 Jobs to Shore Up Business,” Wall Street Journal, October 14, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-shedding-about-350-jobs-to-shore-up-business-11571092680; Heather Somerville, “Uber Booked Another Quarterly Loss as Revenue Climbed,” Wall Street Journal, November 4, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-booked-another-quarterly-loss-as-revenue-climbed-11572901549; Heather Somerville, “Uber Sells Self-Driving-Car Unit to Autonomous-Driving Startup,” Wall Street Journal, December 7, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-lyft-face-a-no-sharing-economy-11603710180; Heather Somerville and Mark Maurer, “Uber Cuts More Than 400 Technical Jobs,” Wall Street Journal, September 10, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/uber-cuts-more-than-400-technical-jobs-11568144111; Georgia Wells, “Uber Cites Tight Competition After Posting $1 Billion Loss,” Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/ubers-first-quarter-loss-tops-1-billion-11559246846; Stephen Wilmot, “Uber’s Long Road to Profits,” Wall Street Journal, August 22, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/ubers-long-road-to-profits-11566471068; Julia Carrie Wong, “Disgruntled drivers and ‘cultural challenges’: Uber admits to its biggest risk factors,” Guardian, April 12, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/apr/11/uber-ipo-risk-factors; Michael Wursthorn, “Lyft Shares Rally on Hopes Price Increases Will Drive Profit,” Wall Street Journal, August 26, 2019, https://www.wsj.com/articles/lyft-shares-rally-on-hopes-price-increases-will-drive-profits-11566845457
  8. [8]Farhad Manjoo, “The Uber I.P.O. Is a Moral Stain on Silicon Valley,” New York Times, May 1, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/01/opinion/uber-ipo.html; Dhruv Mehrotra and Aaron Gordon, “Uber And Lyft Take A Lot More From Drivers Than They Say,” Jalopnik, August 26, 2019, https://jalopnik.com/uber-and-lyft-take-a-lot-more-from-drivers-than-they-sa-1837450373; Alexa Noel, “Revised MIT Study Says Uber, Lyft Drivers Make About $8 or $10 per Hour,” Points Guy, March 8, 2018, https://thepointsguy.com/2018/03/revised-mit-study-says-uber-lyft-drivers-make-about-8-or-10-per-hour/; Kari Paul, “Uber drivers plan shutdown over ‘poverty wages’ as company goes public,” Guardian, April 25, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/apr/24/uber-drivers-strike-ipo; José Rodríguez, Jr., “The Aftermath Of Prop 22 Is Not As Happy As Big Tech Promised,” Jalopnik, February 18, 2021, https://jalopnik.com/the-aftermath-of-prop-22-is-not-as-happy-as-big-tech-pr-1846299686; Alexander Sammon, “Prop 22 Is Here, and It’s Already Worse Than Expected,” American Prospect, January 15, 2021, https://prospect.org/labor/prop-22-is-here-already-worse-than-expected-california-gig-workers/
  9. [9]Amy Gardner, “Trump pressured a Georgia elections investigator in a separate call legal experts say could amount to obstruction,” Washington Post, March 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-call-georgia-investigator/2021/01/09/7a55c7fa-51cf-11eb-83e3-322644d82356_story.html
  10. [10]Amy Gardner, “Trump pressured a Georgia elections investigator in a separate call legal experts say could amount to obstruction,” Washington Post, March 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-call-georgia-investigator/2021/01/09/7a55c7fa-51cf-11eb-83e3-322644d82356_story.html

It’s the March after the November, but for Trumpsters, the campaign continues


Fig. 1. Photograph by author, March 14, 2021.

The reddish hue on this tree is a sign it is budding, an early sign of spring, and also that at least one more freeze is surely on the way.


Trumpsters

I’ve mostly been forgetting to mention that a lot of Donald Trump campaign signs and flags are reappearing now around Pittsburgh after having disappeared, presumably in well-deserved shame, following the U.S. Capitol coup attempt.[1] I’ve also seen banners proclaiming that “[Joe] Biden is not my president.” I’m not quite sure what to make of this: Clearly these folks continue to support Trump. It seems unlikely that even they entertain any hope now of overturning the November election result. But I think we can surmise that they don’t accept the result.

And given the violence that surrounded that coup attempt, and a potential for violence that presumably remains, this can’t be a good thing.


Twitter

Twitter suspended users mentioning a city in Tennessee named Memphis. Yes, really. It was a “bug,” they say.[2] No, Twitter, no. It is far more than a bug. It’s what you get for using artificial idiocy. It’s the very sort of thing I said would happen.[3]

Alyse Stanley, “Twitter Banned Me for Saying the ‘M’ Word: Memphis,” Gizmodo, March 15, 2021, https://gizmodo.com/twitter-banned-me-for-saying-the-m-word-memphis-1846474378


  1. [1]David Benfell, “The danger that remains,” Not Housebroken, January 22, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/01/07/the-danger-that-remains/; David Benfell, “Riot or insurrection? Lies or madness?” Not Housebroken, January 22, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/01/12/riot-or-insurrection-lies-or-madness/; David Benfell, “The State of the Disunion, 2021,” Not Housebroken, January 22, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/01/10/the-state-of-the-disunion-2021/; David Benfell, “The second farce,” Not Housebroken, February 14, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/02/14/the-second-farce/
  2. [2]Alyse Stanley, “Twitter Banned Me for Saying the ‘M’ Word: Memphis,” Gizmodo, March 15, 2021, https://gizmodo.com/twitter-banned-me-for-saying-the-m-word-memphis-1846474378
  3. [3]David Benfell, “Our new Satan: artificial idiocy and big data mining,” Not Housebroken, February 23, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2020/01/13/our-new-satan-artificial-idiocy-and-big-data-mining/

Testosterone pickup trucks

Trumpsters


Fig. 1. A sticker the author designed for his car’s (a 2007 Toyota Camry Hybrid) back window. Does it help? Maybe.

Although Angie Schmitt barely mentions Donald Trump’s supporters, and indirectly at that, writing for CityLab, she pulls together what I had intuited about Trumpsters and monster pickup trucks, the latter being expressions of heteronormative white masculine rage.[1]

Angie Schmitt, “What Happened to Pickup Trucks?” CityLab, March 11, 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-11/the-dangerous-rise-of-the-supersized-pickup-truck


Pandemic

I am looking forward to my second shot on March 26. Two weeks thereafter, I will be a little bit freer.[2]

John Torres, “‘Vaccine passports’: Will they be available in the U.S. in time for summer?” NBC News, March 14, 2021, https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/vaccine-passports-will-they-be-available-u-s-time-summer-n1261022


  1. [1]Angie Schmitt, “What Happened to Pickup Trucks?” CityLab, March 11, 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-11/the-dangerous-rise-of-the-supersized-pickup-truck
  2. [2]Lena H. Sun and Lenny Bernstein, “Fully vaccinated people can visit with nearby grandchildren, dine indoors with one another, CDC says,” Washington Post, March 8, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/03/08/vaccinated-people-cdc-guidance/