Learn about it safely by, you know, reading

I went to the Detroit Institute of Arts this afternoon. The reason for going is an exhibit that ends in ten days. It is By Her Hand: Artemisia Gentileschi and Women Artists in Italy, 1500-1800. The website says there are 17 women featured. It didn’t seem to be that many, but I didn’t count. Gentileschi is the featured artist, though I hadn’t heard of her or any of the others. A big part of their creative work involved how to be noticed in a male dominated world. One made several self portraits in a variety of settings, saying see I am good enough paint you and your family. One did miniatures. Another painted on ivory. Gentileschi was able to do religious themes – such as large altar pieces for churches. One was a nun who sold paintings to support the convent and taught her fellow sisters to paint. Beyond the paintings patrons commissioned many of these women painted scenes featuring strong women. Judith and her maidservant cutting off the head of Holofernes was depicted several times. Madonna and child was also a frequent subject – I was amused by one where there was a ring of flowers instead of a halo and one can’t tell whether the child is bestowing the ring or playfully snatching it away. I finished the book Managing Martians by Donna Shirley. It is her autobiography, mostly of her time at the Jet Propulsion Lab managing the team that developed Sojourner, the first rover on Mars, the one that got there in 1997. The first part of the story is of her growing up in rural Oklahoma where she definitely didn’t fit in. She wanted to go to space, and Mars in particular (science fiction stories set on Mars fueled that dream). She wasn’t accepted as an astronaut, so going there virtually on a rover would have to do. There was the usual problems of being a woman at JPL in the 1960s and not doing a traditional woman’s job. And then the problems of being a woman manager. And the ever present we can’t give you the job of developing something that flies in space if you’ve never developed something that flies in space. Turns out she was a good manager. Her style was different from other managers who determined their worth by the number of people they controlled. She wanted none of that hierarchy stuff. She recognized that her team would talk about concepts that made no sense to her and that was fine. There were other colleagues who could verify the ideas. Her management style helped JPL reduce costs. After Sojourner successfully worked on the moon Shirley wrote a book on how to manage creative people. She said it is different than a lot of books on management styles in that they seemed classroom exercises and she figured it out by doing it. I enjoyed the book. I also enjoyed the technical discussions about this problem appeared and this is how we fixed it. None of this was deeply technical, but might be a turnoff for people who are definitely not technical. There was also a lot of discussion of how JPL projects were funded by NASA. And that was followed by how to balance cost with all the other requirements. I learned there was always a lot of balancing – we could do this, but it weighs too much. Or this, but it would have to be a less expensive version. If you are interested in how spacecraft get developed you will enjoy this book. I downloaded Michigan’s COVID data, updated yesterday. The peak in new cases per day for last week was lowered, but the peak this week is higher. The peaks in the last three weeks are 3250, 3993, and 4807. Counties in the Detroit metropolitan area and in a few other places in the state have now said masks in public are recommended. As for deaths per day, for the last six weeks they have been at 15 and below and in the last ten days they have been at 8 and below (though these are likely to change as more data comes in). Remember towards the start of the pandemic the meat packers were saying there is a meat shortage and the nasty guy responded with an executive order keeping the plants open in spite of the unsafe conditions that killed hundreds of workers? Laura Clawson of Daily Kos reported it was all a lie.

Now, the House select subcommittee investigating the pandemic response says that the meatpacking industry misled the public about the threat of a shortage and basically drafted Trump’s executive order keeping the plants open.

Mark Sumner of Kos reported that Sweden and Finland have applied to join NATO – and there is opposition. Erdogan, the autocratic leader of Turkey is objecting, saying Sweden is harboring Kurdish terrorists. For those who don’t remember history of the last 35 years, the Kurds are a people who don’t have their own country. Their people are split between Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. And Turkey considers them terrorists. When Russia invaded Syria a lot of people fled. And some of them are Kurdish and some of them went to Sweden. The real reason, wrote Sumner, is Turkey committed a NATO no-no. They bought military equipment from Russia (quite a while ago). In response the US canceled Turkey’s order of 100 fighter jets.

So Erdogan is holding up the entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO until the U.S. agrees to give him his planes. But he can’t quite say it that way, so he’s making other excuses while waiting to see if he can get what he wants.

President Milanovic of Croatia saw an opening. He is also opposing Sweden and Finland. His complaint is about neighboring Bosnia, who he thinks are treating the Croats living there in some unkind way. Russia has invaded Ukraine, in which people are dying and which has dire consequences for the world. Sweden and Finland see a genuine threat to their neutrality and safety. And Erdogan and Milanovic are using the situation to try to address a pet peeve. Sumner has a good word for them – jackasses. Kos of Kos reported that Russia might be about to take a small city or three. Twitter now has hyperventilating accounts of how disastrous this will be for Ukraine. Other accounts are full of joy that Ukraine is about to be defeated. Kos said it is time for the big picture. Some of that is what I wrote about yesterday – Russia’s shrinking ambitions. Another part is why Ukraine stuck around so long in the cities that Russia has been bombarding.

Ukraine’s strategy is simple—bleed Russia while buying time, as hundreds of thousands of Ukraine’s reserves train up and equip with the current influx of western arms. Over the last several days, several Ukrainian military and intelligence officials have referenced late summer as the inflection point at which Ukraine will start liberating territory. And not just post-invasion territory, but the entire Donbas and Crimea. All of it. It’s tough, ambitious talk, but the timeline speaks to Ukraine’s strategy— to hold out another four months as the nation mobilizes.

So don’t worry that Russia has taken a town or three. Kos warned that Azovstal factory in Mariupol is a toxic waste dump. If Russia isn’t careful the toxins could be released, which would kill life in the Sea of Azov and damage the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. Alas, we know how careful Russia is. George Johnson, who uses they/them pronouns, wrote the book All Boys Aren’t Blue. They talked to Marissa Higgins of Kos. The books is about growing up black and queer in a family that was supportive but didn’t have the language. The book has earned serious accolades and Johnson has received letters and emails from readers who say the book changed their lives. Wrote Higgins quoting Johnson:

“When you're getting that type of messaging from so many people in the world, you know that you created something that is not just deeply impactful but is a change agent. The book is shifting culture. And how do we know that? Because we're watching them attack.” And attack they are.

This book is one of the top books that has been banned or targeted for banning. The usual reason is to say certain scenes are pornographic.

The book, in fact, is not pornography. It does include passages about sexual abuse ... a subject that teenagers and young adults can learn about safely by, you know, reading. And not just reading whatever random thing they find on the internet, but a book that’s been widely praised by editors, teachers, and librarians—you know, actual experts in what’s appropriate for the age group they work with.

Johnson said the real reason for the book bans and for many other things conservatives are doing these days is they are freaking out that the country is becoming more non-white. They want to maintain white supremacy. Leah McElrath tweeted:

By adhering to white supremacist ideology, some white people mistakenly believe they are raising themselves up or putting others down. What they are really doing is disconnecting themselves from their full spiritual capacity as sentient beings capable of connection. It’s sad.

The Federal Elections Commission bars politicians from repaying loans to their own campaigns by receiving donations over $250K after election day. It is important for new candidates to loan money to their campaigns to get started. It is also important to control how those loans are repaid. Allowing donors to give big donations after election day to pay off those loans means the money goes straight into the candidates pocket. And that is indistinguishable from a bribe. Rebekah Sager of Kos reported that of course, Sen. Ted Cruz loaned his campaign $260K so he would have a case to take to the Supremes. This week the Supremes sided with Cruz, essentially legalizing a method of bribery. The six justice majority says candidates need to be able to loan to their campaign, no matter the size of the loan. Kagan wrote the dissent noting this leads to government corruption.