Separated by A Degree

One of the earliest joys of the Internet for many of us was the ability to uncover just how closely connected we all are with others. We previously had no easy way of knowing that stuff. A few degrees of separation were all that separated each of us from presidents, actors, athletes, billionaires and beauty queens.

Alternatively, we found out we were not all that far removed from some pretty nasty characters as well.

We also cross paths with people all the time, online and off, and one of my preoccupations, once I really connect with someone, is to wonder how closely we may have been to encountering each other sometime in the past.

Perhaps we passed within one block of each other in some random city years ago -- one of us going one direction, one in another.

We just missed.

As I sort through the news, these sort of connections and missed connections pop up all the time.

One of the ancients still kicking in the Senate, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, was a 40ish chair of a House agricultural committee when he questioned a 30ish journalist rather harshly half a lifetime ago. 

He had a coarse Midwestern twang and probably assumed the reporter was some city slicker who cared only about an environmental issue he termed the "Circle of Poison," and that he could care less for the plight of farmers like those in his district.

They sparred over pesticides but he seemed surprised when the journalist described his concern for the small farmers who were among the primary victims of the multinational agrochemical companies he'd exposed in his book.

That was many years ago now, probably forty. I doubt he even remembers the encounter or knew that the city clicker he met that day was the only son of a man who grew up on a small farm in Ontario.

***

THE HEADLINES:

* Biden defends his social agenda bill, saying the cost will be zero -- The president argued that the cost of the package — composed of significant investments in health care, climate, education and the social safety net — will be offset by tax hikes on the wealthy and big corporations. (WP)

* Republican Review of Arizona Vote Fails to Show Stolen Election -- The criticized review showed much the same results as in November, with 99 more Biden votes and 261 fewer Trump ones. (NYT)

* How Facebook’s ‘metaverse’ became a political strategy (WP)

* U.S. condemns Taliban's reported plan to reinstate executions, amputations (Reuters)

* For India’s Military, a Juggling Act on Two Hostile Fronts -- Tensions with China and Pakistan stretch a cash-starved military, while the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban removes a potential ally. (NYT)

* Radical leader of Pakistan’s Red Mosque emboldened by Taliban takeover of Afghanistan (WP)

* COVID-19 vaccine boosters could mean billions for drugmakers (AP)

* Swamped with covid patients, Washington hospitals struggle to avoid Idaho’s fate (WP)

* Covid-19 Panel Probing Virus Origins Is Disbanded (WSJ)

* Sen. Grassley, oldest GOP senator at 88, announces he will seek another term (WP)

* Democrats Consider Adding Carbon Tax to Budget Bill -- A tax on carbon dioxide pollution could be the single most effective policy to tackle climate change. It could also be politically explosive. (NYT)

* Dying crops, spiking energy bills, showers once a week. In South America, the climate future has arrived. (WP)

* In aging Germany, the young get desperate over climate (Reuters)

* When the FBI seizes your messages from Big Tech, you may not know it for years (WP)

* The Cost of Insuring Expensive Waterfront Homes Is About to Skyrocket -- New federal flood insurance rates that better reflect the real risks of climate change are coming. (NYT)

* EU Honors Angela Merkel’s Tenure By Giving Her Greece (The Onion)

"A Person Not a Book"

In Denmark, there are libraries where you can borrow a person instead of a book to listen to their life story for 30 minutes.  The aim is to fight against prejudices.  Each person has a title - "unemployed", "refugee", "bipolar", etc.  - but by listening to their story, you realize how much you shouldn't "judge a book by its cover".  This innovative and brilliant project is active in more than 50 countries.  It's called "The Human Library".

____________________________________

It's worth pondering how we label each other and how those labels influence the opinions of others. Just one word about a person can elicit an unintended image.

When I'm writing, I try to stay vigilant about this, because if I am careless, the image evoked in a reader's mind could influence them in ways I have no intention of doing.

And if there was one takeaway from interviewing hundreds of people in my journalism career,  it is that people's complexities resist stereotyping.

Therefore, we all might do a better job of describing people by directly juxtaposing their various contradictions -- at least the ones that that strike us. 

For example: "She doesn't look you in the eye when she talks to you, which can make it seem like she is shy. She looks off in the distance somewhere. But when she is finished, she fixes a piercing gaze straight into your eyes, awaiting your response. At that moment you realize she isn't shy at all, just respectful. Demanding even."

Or: "He comes off as blustery when you first meet him. It's like he carries around a mental checklist of his major accomplishments -- one, two, three -- which are guaranteed to impress you. As you get to know him, however, you realize just how uncertain about himself he really is, and how desperately he would like you to like him. Maybe he tries too hard."

This dialectical approach to description zeros in but leaves room for alternative interpretations.

So I realize that the Danish library project is geared toward a slightly different issue -- making the voices of people accessible despite labels that may conjure pejorative images.

In that context, personally I struggle when presenting my Afghan friends, past and present, to American and European readers. Unless you have been there, and experienced their warmth and vulnerability and strength and ruthlessness first-hand, it is difficult to express in writing.

Especially in English.

Actually, in my lowest moments, I fear that the Afghan experience does not translate linguistically or culturally. I could labor for many, many hours just to compose each sentence of description, only to fail. 

So let me put it directly: Forget what I say. If you would go there and meet them yourself, you would never forget them the rest of your life.

(Thanks to my friend and journalist Bruce Koon for the Denmark lead.)

***

THE HEADLINES:

* Since Covid-19 Hit, Research on Viruses Has Exploded. Is It Safe? (WSJ)

* The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention endorsed COVID-19 booster shots for Americans age 65 and older, nursing home residents, and those aged 50 and older who have risky underlying health conditions. But CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky made an additional recommendation her agency's advisers had rejected: booster shots for people ages 18 and older who are health care workers or who work at jobs with increased risk of being exposed to the coronavirus. [AP, NYT, WP]

* VIDEO: Cargo Ships Back Up Off the California Coast -- A record number of vessels were anchored off the coast of Southern California, waiting to unload cargo. The backlog came amid a surge in demand for imported goods and supply-chain disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic. (AP)

* Moderna’s chief expects enough coronavirus vaccine for everyone by next year. Much of the world is still waiting. (WP)

* Biden says COVID booster shots will be free and accessible (Reuters)

* Trapped Afghan Women Fear Retribution Under Taliban Rule (WSJ)

* As the Taliban bars some girls from school, their mothers’ dreams are also shattered (WP)

* VIDEO: Afghanistan’s Health System Is on the ‘Brink of Collapse,’ W.H.O. Says -- Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the W.H.O. director general, warned of an “imminent humanitarian catastrophe” as the country’s health care system struggles with a loss of foreign funding and dwindling supplies. (AP)

* Looming economic crisis overshadows Afghanistan talks at U.N. (WP)

* As Debt Default Looms, Yellen Faces Her Biggest Test Yet -- The Treasury secretary must wade into a standoff between Democrats and Republicans over raising the debt limit. (NYT)

* The Senate Small Business Committee has been unable to vote on the nomination of Dilawar Syed for deputy administrator of the Small Business Administration because Republicans have boycotted the vote. If confirmed, Syed would become the highest-ranking Muslim official in American history. But like other Muslim Americans in public life, he is facing questions from Republicans about his allegiances, stemming from his religious faith. [HuffPost]

*  New York Passes Sweeping Bills to Improve Conditions for Delivery Workers -- A package of legislation from the City Council set minimum pay and working conditions, placing New York at the forefront of regulating a multibillion-dollar industry. (NYT)

* Thunberg joins climate rally in Germany ahead of election (AP)

* Leaders to UN: A warmer world is a more violent one, too (AP)

* Some Species Are Changing Along With the Climate-- Warmer conditions have prompted animals and plants to adopt new habits and evolve new traits: Squid are shrinking, lizards are growing bigger toes and trees are migrating (WSJ)

* World's youth take to the streets again to battle climate change (Reuters)

* The cinematic escape of six prisoners who tunneled out of an Israeli penitentiary earlier this month shone a light on Israel's mass incarceration of Palestinians, one of the many bitter fruits of the conflict. (AP)

* Tens Of Thousands Of Black Women Vanish Each Year. This Website Tells Their Stories (NPR)

* "In Denmark, there are libraries where you can borrow a person instead of a book to listen to their life story for 30 minutes.  The aim is to fight against prejudices.  Each person has a title - "unemployed", "refugee", "bipolar", etc.  - but by listening to their story, you realize how much you shouldn't "judge a book by its cover".  This innovative and brilliant project is active in more than 50 countries.  It's called "The Human Library". (LinkedIn)

* In Aging Japan, Under 75 Is the New ‘Pre-Old’ (WSJ)

* Ancient Footprints Push Back Date of Human Arrival in the Americas -- Human footprints found in New Mexico are about 23,000 years old, a study reported, suggesting that people may have arrived long before the Ice Age’s glaciers melted. (NYT) The first footprints were found in a dry lake bed in White Sands National Park in 2009. (AP)

* NASA's big new telescope could find hints of life on other planets. (NPR)

* Sleeping Beauty's forest is dying. It's not the only climate crisis facing Germany's next chancellor (CNN)

* Long, Loud ‘Umm’ Heralds Beginning Of Sentence (The Onion)

Yin Yang News

There are all kinds of currents running through the news cycle -- some hopeful and some not so much.

Women educators are determined to preserve the right of girls to continue to go to school under the Taliban rule, but the Taliban is coming out in defense of its strict (and incorrect) interpretation of Sharia law.

The Taliban advocates suppression of women. The Quran does not. Luckily, one of the benefits of the past 20 years of the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan is that a generation of women has finally had the opportunity for a good education.

And they will resist any attempt to take that right away from their daughters.

***

The Wikimedia Foundation, a former client of mine, has raised a $100 million endowment. Among the dozens of companies I consulted with during my career, I always had a special place in my heart for Wikipedia, the foundation's main product.

The simple idea of summoning volunteers from all over the planet to gather, publish and maintain custody of the total of collective human knowledge is exactly the kind of hugely unrealistic idea that attracts me.

What did I do for them? Help them produce their annual report and main fundraising document. On that project, I worked with two brilliant designers, Rhonda Rubinstein and David Peters.

It was just for a few years but my visits to the foundations' office in Soma stand out as moments when I instinctively knew I was doing the right thing.

***

Less hopeful news is three of our seasons are shortening while one -- summer -- is lengthening. As with most global climate news, there is no silver lining to this one. 

But some experts think they can see the end of the Covid pandemic and that it may be about a year from now. 

That's a hopeful thought so for now I think I'll end on that...

***

THE HEADLINES:

* Women in Afghanistan Are Ready to Defy the Taliban and Teach Girls --Teachers in Afghanistan say they fear the gains of the last 20 years – one of the few Afghan success stories – will be lost, with the Taliban yet to announce when girls can return to school. (Vice News)

* Islamic State uses Taliban's own tactics to attack Afghanistan's new rulers (Reuters)

* Don’t isolate the Taliban, Pakistan urges (AP)

*  WHO urges international donors to resume Afghanistan health funding (Reuters)

 

* Taliban official: Strict punishment, executions will return -- 

One of the founders of the Taliban and the chief enforcer of its harsh interpretation of Islamic law when they last ruled Afghanistan said the hard-line movement will once again carry out executions and amputations of hands, though perhaps not in public. 

(AP)

* Pressure Grows on U.S. Companies to Share Covid Vaccine Technology -- Moderna accepted $2.5 billion in taxpayer money to develop its Covid-19 vaccine. But officials in the U.S. and overseas are having trouble persuading the company to license its technology. (NYT)

*COVID-19 deaths have climbed to an average of more than 1,900 a day for the first time since early March, and experts say the virus is preying largely on the 71 million unvaccinated Americans. For health workers, the deaths — combined with misinformation and disbelief about the virus — have been “heart-wrenching, soul-crushing.” The nation saw 3,000 deaths a day back in December, but that was when almost no one was vaccinated. [AP]

* Moderna chief executive sees pandemic over in a year (Reuters)

* African leaders highlight vaccine inequity in UN speeches (AP)

* Every season except summer is getting shorter, a sign of trouble (WP)

* F.D.A. Authorizes Pfizer Booster Shots for Older and At-Risk Americans (NYT)

* Biden pledges to double U.S. donations of Pfizer vaccine to poor nations (WP)

* EPA to cut greenhouse gases thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide (WP)

* Flying Microchips The Size Of A Sand Grain Could Be Used For Population Surveillance (NPR)

* Privacy Reset: A guide to the important settings you should change now (WP)

* Wikimedia Foundation reaches $100 million Endowment goal (Wikimedia)

* Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two laws aimed at protecting the privacy of people seeking abortions, drawing a sharp contrast with Texas. One prohibits filming near an abortion clinic, while the other makes it easier to keep sensitive medical information confidential. (AP)

* Biden White House leans toward releasing information about Trump and Jan. 6 attack, setting off legal and political showdown (WP)

*Senate Republicans let the Violence Against Women Act's authorization expire in 2019 after they couldn't agree among themselves on what to put in a bill of their own. But now, the Senate may actually be close to introducing a bill to reauthorize it with support from both parties, writes Jennifer Bendery. [HuffPost]

* Paleontologists Determine Dinosaurs Were Killed By Someone They Trusted (The Onion)

Letter From Helmand.9: "Her World Has Lost Its Color"

[NOTE: This is the ninth letter from a young Afghan friend about life in his country since the Taliban took over.]

Dear David:

Bakhti [a pseudonym] is a friend of mine who is 24 now. Two years ago, she was the top student in her university class in Kabul, graduating with a degree in political science. While we were students, she always motivated me by her speeches. 

Despite the extreme hardship in Kabul of that time, which included suicide attacks and frequent blasts, Bakhti remained full of hope and ambition. She was competitive and driven. To maintain her position at the top of the class, she studied late every night,  read a book every week, and even wrote book reviews to share with me. We frequently debated, agreeing on some issues while disagreeing about others. She talked about her ambitions to find a job after graduation with a good salary. 

We often walked together in the streets of Kabul, talking about various subjects, taking photos, listening to music, and reciting poetry.

When I called her a few days ago to ask how she was doing, she described for me the day the Taliban entered Kabul: it was a Sunday, the hands of the clock stood at eleven in the morning, and everyone was running, fleeing from the invaders. The moment seemed frozen in time, the sunlight suspended, nature in a vacuum – if there was motion from the birds or the leaves on the trees, nobody saw it.

A month has passed since that terrible day, and Bakhti says life is not getting any easier. Her world has lost its color. Friendships are a thing of the past. Women have covered their faces, imprisoned behind the walls of their houses. There is nothing they can do but mourn their lost liberty. They feel stateless and homeless.

Our dreams of salvation at the hands of the Americans were false. In the end, America did nothing but transfer power from one Talib to another. The safety we felt when the Americans were here was naive. Would it have been better if we had not planted the seeds of hope in our hearts?

The Taliban, the enemies of our peace and advancement, killed us at home, on the road, at school, at university, wherever possible. They blew up our schools and universities, massacred us in the classroom. Perhaps foolishly, we kept going back – to our schools, universities and aspirations.

Somehow we forgot that we were living in a country with people like Ashraf Ghani and the Taliban, where the Afghan people were nothing but a means to power. We were sacrificed for their goals.

In my hopes for a better tomorrow, I would run to my classes at the university through bullets and explosions, always in fear of persecution. Eventually I graduated, and thought I had succeeded, with a job, an income, and my independence. I had friends to talk to, a full life of work and socializing. I felt free, the wind in my hair.

But the takeover of our country by the Taliban has changed all that, for me and for Bakhti.  Recently she went to a demonstration with her friends, demanding rights for the women of Afghanistan, but they were met with whips and threats of even worse violence. Now she stays home all day, often crying. She feels her voice has been silenced.

It is an indescribable pain when a person loses her job, education, freedom and everything she has lived for, overnight. Bakhti feels her dreams have died.

***

THE HEADLINES:

* Special Report: Backers of Trump's false fraud claims seek to control next elections (Reuters)

* ‘An iron curtain’: Australia’s covid rules are stranding people at state borders (WP)

* COVID-19 creates dire US shortage of teachers, school staff (AP)

* We Have Gone Badly Off Track in the Global Covid Fight (NYT)

* COVID-19 sends northern Chinese city into semi-shutdown (Reuters)

* Coronavirus infections among children accounted for nearly 26% of all new cases reported last week. The latest boom among children has primarily been seen in the South. “Child cases are high in places where community cases are high,” Dr. Sean O’Leary, vice chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics committee on infectious diseases, told HuffPost. [HuffPost]

* VIDEO: Brazilian President Says He Is Not Vaccinated (AP)

* U.S. to donate 500 million more COVID-19 vaccine doses to other countries -Biden (Reuters)

* Delta is the dominant covid variant worldwide, WHO says (WP)

* California COVID rates are low — Bay Area’s are even lower (SFC)

* Brazil’s health minister tests positive for coronavirus at U.N. General Assembly (WP)

* Under Taliban, thriving Afghan music scene heads to silence (AP)

* Taliban Complete Interim Government, Still Without Women (NYT)

* Taliban seeks to attend United Nations General Assembly in New York (WP)

* Sunni scholars who left Afghanistan hope Islam's tolerant message survives Taliban (Reuters)

* A Botched Drone Strike in Kabul Started With the Wrong Car (NYT)

* Philanthropists pledge record $5 billion to protect nature (Reuters)

* Birds Thrived During Covid-19 Lockdowns, Study Shows(WSJ)

* This summer, California fires emitted twice as much carbon dioxide as during the same period last year, and far more than any other summer in nearly two decades. (Cal Today)

* New WHO air-quality guidelines aim to cut deaths linked to fossil fuels (Reuters)

* Amid furor over border images, Biden faces backlash from Democrats (WP)

* Latin American Migration, Once Limited to a Few Countries, Turns Into a Mass Exodus (WSJ)

* U.S. default this fall would cost 6 million jobs, wipe out $15 trillion in wealth, study says (WP)

* 'No one would be spared': Debt default would set off dire consequences (CNN)

* A new study indicates that the relatively low mass of Mars allowed most of its water to be lost to space billions of years ago, rather than retained on its surface. (NPR)

* New Program Encourages Americans To Get Vaccine To Prevent It From Going To Foreigners (The Onion)