2:00PM Water Cooler 10/14/2024

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

Bird Song of the Day

Blue-and-white Mockingbird, Antigua Guatemala–Cerro de la Cruz, Sacatepéquez, Guatemala.

* * *
In Case You Might Miss…

1. Democrat bedwetting
2. Kamala messaging disasters: Walz goes hunting, manly men, Obama and black men
3. Walz oppo bubbles up, not yet popped.
4. Labor Secretary Su flies to Seattle, Boeing’s doom loop.

* * *
In Case You Might Miss…

1. Democrat bedwetting
2. Kamala messaging disasters: Walz goes hunting, manly men, Obama and black men
3. Labor Secretary Su flies to Seattle, Boeing’s doom loop.

* * *

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 than thirty days to go!

Friday’s RCP Poll Averages:

If you ignore the entire concept of margin of error and go with the narrative, another good week for Trump, especially in MI and PA, tbough not, oddly, in the two hurricane swing states, GA and NC. Of course, we on the outside might as well be examining the entrails of birds when we try to predict what will happen to a subset of voters (undecided; irregular) in a subset of states (swing), and the irregulars especially 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!}.

* * *

“‘This Is Going To Be Too Close for Comfort’ David Plouffe on the state of play for his boss, Kamala Harris, and what he thinks of the ‘bed-wetters.'” (interview) [David Plouffe, New York Magazine]. Plouffe: “There are independents. Most independents behave in most elections like Democrats or Republicans, but there are some in the middle that definitely fluctuate election to election. They tend to be overrepresented in the true swing voter universe but there are a bunch of these independents who generally consider themselves Republicans who are repelled by Trump. And so you ask: How do we go from basically 48 to 50? Well, it’s going to be some of those voters. It’s going to be making sure we do a very good job of turnout, it’s going to be very important that we maximize our vote share among Democrats, and we think we’re headed to an exceedingly high number there. I will say: Turnout is very important to us. We’re spending a lot of time on it, a lot of money on it, a lot of energy on it. But I think Trump has more fragility because he really is reliant — and this is unusual, because usually this describes Democrats — on first-time voters or infrequent voters. And he’s got a lot riding on that. It doesn’t seem to be that he has built the kind of operation in the battleground states that would be consistent with executing on that…. What’s different this time than ’16 or even ’20 is he really is reliant on a lot of people who have never voted before, have never voted for a Republican before, or have maybe voted in one of the last four elections. I’m not sure they’ve built the organization for that.” • Interesting that Plouffe accepts Brownstein’s theory of the case case that irregular voters are key. Even more interestingly, Plouffe thinks that the Trump campaign is “fragile” because its trying to expand the electorate in a way they are not.

“Harris losing ground with young Latino men, exclusive USA-TODAY polls find” [MSN]. “Vice President Kamala Harris is losing support among young Latino men, even as she continues to hold a lead over Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump among Latino voters in Arizona and Nevada – two key states that will help determine the 2024 election, according to two exclusive new USA TODAY/Suffolk University polls… David Paleologos, director of Suffolk University Political Research Center, said while it’s good news for Harris that she’s leading with Latino voters in both states, the current margin likely won’t be enough for her to claim victories there. ‘It’s only young people and males, but that offset … is the reason why Harris’ numbers are not where they should be (for her to win),’ Paleologos said. Harris’ polling in both states among Latino voters is slightly trailing where Biden was in 2020.”

* * *

Kamala (D): “Walz goes pheasant hunting with his own Beretta as campaign makes appeal to gun owners” [CBS]. “Sleepy Eye, Minnesota — Carrying a Beretta shotgun, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz trekked through tall straw-like grass for three hours on Saturday for opening day of the state’s pheasant hunting season, but didn’t get one shot off despite his efforts. ‘There’s good days and there’s great days pheasant hunting,’ Walz said when the day wrapped up.”

Bad staffwork on multiple levels here. Leave everything else aside, including the crass stereotyping. Did they have no subject matter expert to consult to make sure Walz’s gun was the right sort of gun? And you can say Walz should have known, but it’s still the staff’s job to prevent gaffes. Now the campaign is worse off than before; both pandering and ineffective.

Kamala (D): “Dude…No! Pro-Kamala Harris ad targeting ‘real men’ is mocked as the ‘cringiest ever created’: ‘Have they ever met a male human?'” [Daily Mail]. “The video features various men declaring their interest in ‘manly clichés’ like bears, drinking bourbon, eating steaks, fixing cars, and lifting weights… The ad features men with horses, motorcycles, in a mechanics shop, sitting on a truck, lifting weights, or leaning against a fence… It was shared on the VoteSaveAmerica social media pages, organized by the Crooked.com group that runs Pod Save America.” • For your delectation, here’s the ad:

(“If you have to say it….”) Reminds me of this famous video from back in the day (so denatured Trump plays it at rallies):

Kamala’s supporters have just swapped in different, more up-to-date male stereotypes (which, I suppose, is what identity politcs is all about).

* * *

Waltz oppo:

Here is the current claim, from @DocNetyoutube:

Last night, I was given a statement from the victim of Tim Walz to release this morning. I must tell you; the victim has never told me of his intent to bring Tim Walz to court. I assume this means trying to seek legal recourse, if possible, in a criminal court.

I also have seen… pic.twitter.com/KbGDOiiKBF

— Black Insurrectionist–I FOLLOW BACK TRUE PATRIOTS (@DocNetyoutube) October 14, 2024

>

Big if true. Earlier in this emergent thread, the accuser claimed to have been by Walz to an Indigo Girls concert, as a minor, and abused. (Interestingly, the person who would seem to have been @DocNetyoutube’s victim has already announced himself: “Tim and Gwen Walz were my teachers in high school. That story in the New York Times about them taking a gay student to an Indigo Girls concert—that student was me!”) In the above Tweet, the accuser expands his original claims to include a country concert, and a China trip, on which he claims to have gone. (Here is a description of a China trip; another.) Finally, the political dynamite (1): “When Tim Walz received his DUI [sic]. It was after an evening with me” (“his DUI. It was” is in the original); and (2) a Chinese symbol tatooed on Walz’s upper thigh, and “a small scar on his left arm” (reminds me of Paula Jones on Bill Clinton’s misshapen member). The accuser may come forward (“later”):

He has agreed to. I will announce later..

— Black Insurrectionist–I FOLLOW BACK TRUE PATRIOTS (@DocNetyoutube) October 14, 2024

What I would expect reporters, if any still remain, to do: (1) Find the accuser; if indeed he went on the China trip, it shouldn’t be that hard; (2) interview the other China trip participants; what did they witness, if anything; (3) straighten out the concerts. Were there one or two Indigo Girls concerts; (4) straighten out the timeline. We have the concerts, the China trips, the DUI, Walz’s resignation from the Nebraska school system, and the Walzes moving to a new school system in Minnesota. I don’t have time to put that sequence together and match it up to the accusations.

* * *

Meanwhile, @DocNetyoutube has form:

“EXCLUSIVE: X User ‘Black Insurrectionist’ Agrees to Put Gateway Pundit in Contact with Alleged ABC Whistleblower’s Attorney After Releasing ‘Affidavit’ on Debate Rigging Scandal” [Gateway Pundit]. But: “The Gateway Pundit cannot yet independently verify these allegations, but our legal team has reached out to Black Insurrectionist, who agreed to facilitate contact with the whistleblower’s attorney. In exchange for keeping the whistleblower’s identity confidential, an interview could be arranged to further investigate the claims.” • To my knowledge, there was no interview.

“ABC Finally Addresses MAGA ‘Affidavit’ Claiming It Helped Harris Win Debate” [Daily Beast]. “The “Black Insurrectionist” account, having grown by nearly 30,000 followers, eventually shared the six-page ‘affidavit’ on Sunday. The document is dated Sept. 9, the day before the debate. The person—whose name, address, and signature are blacked out, other than they live in ‘Manhattan New York’ [sic]—alleges they have been with ‘ABC News’ for over 10 years, but they have somehow observed ‘significant transformations in the nature of news reporting at the organization’ since it was acquired by Disney in 1996.” And: “The document also claims to have been verified by a notary public, though the document does not provide a notary seal.” But it gets better: “An article on a little-known blog indicated the alleged whistleblower had been killed in a car crash before they could unveil the affidavit. That proposition was pushed by Greene on X, who claimed that the whistleblower had died ‘according to news reports.’ She then retracted the claim and demanded a ‘serious investigation’ into the document. Even the Gateway Pundit, a far-right website that delves into misinformation and false stories, warned its readers: ‘It’s clear to us that this is a complete hoax.’ (The “Black Insurrectionist” account later claimed they put the website in touch with the whistleblower’s attorney.)” • A car crash. How convenient. And if in fact the whistleblower had an attorney, nothing came of it. Apparently, the whole thing was too much even for Gateway Pundit, which isn’t squeamish.

* * *

Finally, the Black Insurrectionist tweet storm that started it all was spun out in multiple, impropertly threaded, tweets, and it too is a little sketchy. @AgentSelf99B examines the accuser’s putatively original emails, as presented in the form of screen dumps by Black Insurrectionist’s account:

There’s more, but that’s all for now.

* * *

Again, big if true. Maybe Black Insurrectionist got lucky, and the accuser will actually come forward to be vetted. I can well believe that the Kamala operation butchered this. However, “that’s what they would do” doesn’t mean that’s what they did (at least for an accusation like this).

* * *

Kamala (D): “Barack Obama’s Tiresome Condescension Toward Black Men” [New York Magazine]. “One need not equivocate to recognize that there are substantive reasons for Black voters to reject Democrats like Obama and Harris on the same basis as they do Republicans. The framework Obama uses leaves little room for misgivings about the fact that Harris is going to great lengths to collapse the distance between herself and the GOP. When she learned that former vice-president Dick Cheney, a chief architect of the United States’ atrocities during the War on Terror, was planning to vote for her, Harris unironically thanked him for ‘what he has done to serve our country.’ She has become more hawkish on immigration in response to Trump’s naked xenophobia, and she has recommitted to unconditionally sending arms to Israel amid its slaughter of Gazan and Lebanese civilians — a dogmatic position held by Democratic and Republican administrations alike, including Biden’s and Trump’s. During a recent appearance on ABC’s The View, Harris seemed to flub an easy opportunity to distance herself from the unpopular incumbent when she struggled to explain how she would govern differently. But she recovered later that day by reiterating an earlier promise that, unlike Biden, she would appoint a Republican to her Cabinet.” • Commentary:

I’ve met pretty much all the most popular Dems or at least been in spaces with them when we unionized Amazon. One person who I’ve never heard from till this date not even to congratulate workers fighting back is Barrack Obama. He can’t preach that Black man brother talk to me.

— Christian Smalls (@Shut_downAmazon) October 13, 2024

* * *

“Why historian who accurately predicts elections says October surprise is a ‘myth'” [USA Today]. Allan Lichtman, the historian who correctly predicted nine of the ten most recent presidential elections, said in an interview that any October surprise that could upend the 2024 presidential race is a ‘myth.’ Lichtman: “[I]t’s governing, not campaigning that counts. …[T]his whole idea of an October surprise is a huge myth,’ he said. ‘I’ve always made my predictions before then, and never change them.'”

* * *

MI: “Harris’ struggles with Michigan’s working-class voters provides opening for Trump, GOP” [FOX]. “According to a report in The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, prominent Michigan Democrats, including Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, have made appeals to the Harris campaign to focus on the state more as the election draws to a close. They have also warned Harris to sharpen her economic messaging, the report notes, with fears spreading that Trump has done well to court the state’s working class voters. Harris’ struggles have also extended to union members, a group that has long been a stronghold for Democrats in the state. However, an internal poll conducted by Teamsters, one of the country’s largest and most influential unions, found that members in Michigan preferred Trump (61.7%) over Harris (35.2%), while national union leaders declined to make an endorsement in this year’s presidential race, despite supporting President Biden’s campaign in 2020. Harris also failed to gain the support of the International Association of Fire Fighters, which also supported Biden in 2020, though she did gain the support of both United Auto Workers and the Service Employees International Union.” • I can’t imagine Whitmer’s recent “weird” video helped.

Democrats en Déshabillé

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!

* * *

* * *

TABLE 1: Daily Covid Charts

Wastewater
This week[1] CDC October 5	Last Week[2] CDC (until next week):
Variants [3] CDC October 12	Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC October 5
Hospitalization
New York[5] New York State, data October 10:	National [6] CDC September 21:
Positivity
★ National[7] Walgreens October 7:	Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic October 5:
Travelers Data
Positivity[9] CDC September 16:	Variants[10] CDC September 16:
Deaths
Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11]CDC September 28:	Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12]CDC September 28:

LEGEND

1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.

2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”

NOTES

[1] (CDC) Still some hot spots, but I can’t draw circles around entire regions this week. Good news!

[2] (CDC) Last week’s wastewater map.

[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* very popular. XEC has entered the chat.

[4] (ED) Down, but worth noting that Emergency Department use is now on a par with the first wave, in 2020.

[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Definitely down.

[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). I see the “everything in greenish pastels” crowd has gotten to this chart.

[7] (Walgreens) Big drop continues!

[8] (Cleveland) Dropping.

[9] (Travelers: Positivity) Up, though lagged.

[10] (Travelers: Variants).

[11] Deaths low, positivity down.

[12] Deaths low, ED down.

Stats Watch

Manufacturing: “United States NY Empire State Manufacturing Index” [Trading Economics]. “The NY Empire State Manufacturing Index unexpectedly jumped to 11.5 in September 2024, the highest since April 2022, compared to -4.7 in August and forecasts of -3.9.”

* * *

Manfacturing: “Acting US Labor Secretary intervenes to try to end Boeing standoff with union” [Reuters]. “U.S. Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su flew to Seattle to intervene in the labor dispute between Boeing and about 33,000 striking workers that threatens the debt-laden company’s finances.” And: “The latest crisis comes as Boeing’s markets are growing and many of its rivals are scooping up scarce labour to relieve pressure on aerospace supply chains. ‘The trick will be not losing the 10% of people you want to keep, which is even more important than usual in the post pandemic skill shortage environment,’ said Agency Partners analyst Nick Cunningham.” • The pandemic environment isn’t “post,” but nevertheless.

Manufacturing: “Boeing shares are not a buy yet” [The Street]. “The stock will almost certainly see volatile trading this week. What you want to see is a bottom that holds. To get there probably requires these elements: Peace between labor and the company… Guarantee of work in the Puget Sound region…. Shoring up Boeing’s capital position…. Peace with the regulators…. Peace with all the people suing Boeing over the 2018 and 2019 crashes.” • Quite a lot of Ortberg’s plate.

Manufacturing: “Boeing’s endless doom loop gives no respite to new CEO Ortberg” [Fortune]. “[W]ith so-called touch labor accounting for less than 5% for the total cost of a commercial aircraft program, some observers wonder why Boeing isn’t moving with more urgency to end the work stoppage that’s adding to its financial distress. ‘It’s not a needle mover in terms of Boeing profitability,’ said Ken Herbert, analyst with RBC Capital Markets. ‘What are we waiting for here? Every day that goes by, it’s more disruptive and more of a cash drain.'” • Good question!

Manufacturing: “Emirates to Have Serious Talks with Boeing over New 777X Delays” [Aviation A2Z]. “Emirates President Tim Clark expressed skepticism about Boeing’s ability to forecast delivery dates accurately. He highlighted the Type Inspection Authorisation halt on the 777X and the prolonged union strikes as major obstacles. The 777X is crucial for Emirates’ future wide-body fleet strategy, especially since Airbus has ceased A380 production. Clark revealed that Emirates has made significant and costly amendments to its fleet programs due to Boeing’s ‘multiple contractual shortfalls.’ … Aircraft delays have become an industry-wide concern, affecting both Boeing and Airbus. Airlines resort to keeping older aircraft operational longer, often retrofitting them at significant cost.”

* * *

Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 77 Extreme Greed (previous close: 74 Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 69 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Oct 14 at 1:16:35 PM ET. • FIrst transition to Extreme Greed for awhile!

Photo Book

“A window covered with raindrops interests me more than a photograph of a famous person.” –Saul Leiter

Couple walk in snow, ca 1955 © Saul Leiter pic.twitter.com/NwOAoQ1yvE

— Edward Elderman (@edwereddie) October 12, 2024

Zeitgeist Watch

I believe we have seen a representation of Kowloon Walled City before, but from a different source:

Kowloon Walled City, likely the densest place ever built (est. 1.9 million people per square km)

A team of Japanese researchers spent time until the night before it was demolished measuring and drawing the building, creating this incredible section pic.twitter.com/ToeOaarIgH

— Philip Oldfield (@SustainableTall) October 13, 2024

Gallery

“An Astronomer Has Identified the Village Road in This Van Gogh Painting” [Artnet]. “Being able to pinpoint a precise location of an area depicted in an artwork usually isn’t an exact science. However, Donald Olson, an astrophysicist and forensic astronomer at the State University System Regent, has used his scientific training to determine where Vincent van Gogh’s iconic 1884 work, Lane of Poplars at Sunset (now held by the Kröller-Müller Museum in the Netherlands), was in fact painted.” • The logic is too complex to excerpt, but here’s the painting:

Permaculture

Correct, in my view:

“All we are really doing is annihilating processes we don’t understand.” ~Lyle Lewis #thicktrunktuesday https://t.co/HDsSaHY4eJ

— Lyle Lewis (@Race2Extinct) October 8, 2024

Carbon capture? Feh!

News of the Wired

“the quiet art of attention” [stormrider]. “The mind, like a garden, requires tending. It needs patience, a steady hand, and, above all, consistency. There will be days when it seems unruly, when old habits return, and when focus feels elusive. But these days, too, are part of the process. Each small effort, each moment of renewed attention, builds upon the last. Over time, these moments accumulate, and what was once difficult becomes second nature. And so, the journey to mastery of the mind begins not with grand gestures but with the simplest of practices: the practice of paying attention. Attention to the present, attention to what truly matters, and attention to the quiet spaces in between. In this way, step by step, thought by thought, we move closer to that elusive state of clarity, of peace, and of freedom.”

* * *

Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From AM:

AM writes: “High grass in the foreground, view towards Edinburgh in the distance from the #2 course at Gullane, Scotland in mid July, 2024.”

* * *

Readers: Water Cooler is a standalone entity not covered by the annual NC fundraiser. Material here is Lambert’s, and does not express the views of the Naked Capitalism site. If you see a link you especially like, or an item you wouldn’t see anywhere else, please do not hesitate to express your appreciation in tangible form. Remember, a tip jar is for tipping! Regular positive feedback both makes me feel good and lets me know I’m on the right track with coverage. When I get no donations for three or four days I get worried. More tangibly, a constant trickle of donations helps me with expenses, and I factor in that trickle when setting fundraising goals:

Here is the screen that will appear, which I have helpfully annotated:

If you hate PayPal, you can email me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, and I will give you directions on how to send a check. Thank you!