Afghan Report 60: Chaotic Roads, Armed City

(NOTE: Since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in August 2021, an Afghan friend has been sending me exclusive reports of what life is like there. Very few Western reporters remain in the country, so these reports have great significance. I am withholding my friend’s identity to protect his safety.)

Dear David:

Two weeks ago, I traveled from Helmand to Kabul, and then to the village where my parents live for a visit. One day before leaving, I booked the bus ticket so that I could get a seat at the front of the bus. The departure time was stated as 12 pm with a note to "please come 30 minutes before departure." 

Accordingly, I arrived at the terminal at 11:30 am.

I waited a while, but couldn't see anyone near the bus yet. Noon – the scheduled departure time – came and went.

By 1 pm, about twenty other passengers had gathered. Finally, at two o'clock, the driver came and loaded the passengers' belongings in the storage compartment. I asked why the bus didn't leave on time and was told that on Fridays, the Taliban does not allow buses to depart before noon prayer. Drivers should first pray and then leave after 2 pm. 

Several buses, each from a different passenger company, left at the same time. On the way, the bus drivers acted as if it was a car race. Losing meant being humiliated. When passing a vehicle on the two-lane road, if a car was coming from the opposite direction, the bus driver would not brake at all. The opposite car simply had to give way to the bus. 

I was terrified we might have an accident, which unfortunately we eventually did. Before reaching the city of Kandahar, our bus hit a three-wheeler with four passengers. The passengers were two women, a child, and a man. One woman collapsed. The other woman was complaining about her back. The child and the driver were fine with a few blood stains on their faces. 

Taliban officials came and took them all to the hospital, arrested the driver and seized the bus. We passengers boarded another bus and left. The driver of the second bus was driving slower, possibly because of the accident scene from the first bus. 

There are many such traffic accidents in Afghanistan these days because the defacto government does not have the capacity to control the highways and implement traffic laws. So the drivers of cars move at whatever speed they like. 

When we entered Kandahar at 8 pm, I was surprised by the militarized situation. At the head of every alley and intersection, Taliban soldiers were standing with weapons and military uniforms. From the inspections and the presence of all those armed men, it seemed that the city was on the verge of war. When I asked a passenger the reason for the presence of so many armed men, he explained that it was because of the presence of the Taliban leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, in Kandahar. 

These are just some indications of what our life is like here under Taliban rule.

LINKS:

• UN to continue keeping Afghan staff at home over Taliban ban on women (Reuters)

• WHO declares end to COVID global health emergency (Reuters)

• Disease experts warn White House of potential for omicron-like wave of illness (WP)

• North Carolina abortion: 12-week ban likely despite governor's veto threat (BBC)

• Iowa governor will sign bill rolling back labor protections for children (WP)

• Sanders’s $17 minimum wage proposal creates political headache for Schumer (The Hill)

• Apple CEO Tim Cook calls mass layoffs a ‘last resort,’ as the company avoids the giant job cuts of its Big Tech peers (Fortune)

• Google engineer warns it could lose out to open-source technology in AI race (Guardian)

• ChatGPT can pick stocks better than your fund manager (CNN)

• Bing Is a Trap (Atlantic)

• ‘We’ve discovered the secret of immortality. The bad news is it’s not for us’: why the godfather of AI fears for humanity (Guardian)

• It's Over for Lyft -- Uber Wins in Ride-Sharing (Motley Fool)

• Gun Control Is an American Tradition (Slate)

• Jordan Neely, the man killed in chokehold on NYC subway, is remembered as an entertainer shattered by his mother’s murder (CNN)

• Jordan Neely’s Death and a Critical Moment in the Homelessness Crisis (New Yorker)

• Justice Dept. Intensifying Efforts to Determine if Trump Hid Documents (NYT)

• Video of Trump confusing E. Jean Carroll for his ex-wife Marla Maples shown during lawsuit trial (CBS)

• 8 Trump 'fake electors' have accepted immunity in Georgia election probe, attorney says (ABC)

• The little-known group that’s saving Ukraine (Politico)

• A Michigan public school district has banned backpacks inside all school buildings for the remainder of the academic year. Flint Community Schools’ superintendent blamed a rise in “threatening behavior and contraband, including weapons,” at schools across the country. [HuffPost]

• Pollution Reveals What Russian Statistics Obscure: Industrial Decline (WSJ)

• Record low Antarctic sea ice is another alarming sign the ocean’s role as climate regulator is changing (The Conversation)

• Giant blobs of seaweed are hitting Florida. That's when the real problem begins (NPR)

• Secret behind Amazonian 'dark earth' could help speed up forest restoration across the globe (Phys.org)

• Scientists Finally Confirm What's Inside The Moon (ScienceAlert)

• The pendant is 20,000 years old. Ancient DNA shows who wore it. (NBC)

• San Francisco Realtor Shows Couple Earning Under 6-Figure Salary Around Neighborhood’s Best Tent City (The Onion)

 

The Conspirators

 Yesterday, federal prosecutors secured the convictions of four more of the ringleaders of the Jan. 6th Capitol riot, continuing the quest to hold those accountable for attempting to undermine the results of the 2020 election.

These men came from the far right of the political spectrum, of course, but as I processed the news of their convictions, I couldn’t help but think back to when it was groups on the far left who constituted the main threat to the legitimacy of the government.

That was over 50 years ago now, and since then most of the extremists from the Weather Underground and similar groups have done their time and rejoined society in more respectable roles.

Not all of them have renounced the violence they inflicted through bombings and bank robberies and so on, or apologized for the pain and suffering they caused, but they long ago ended their war on society. 

But all too many of extremists of any stripe seem unable to accept that the ideological justifications for their actions simply are wrong. Neither socialism on the left nor authoritarianism on the right are legitimate alternatives to representative democracy, whatever its flaws.

I hope the convicted leaders of the Proud Boys come to renounce their past beliefs now the legal system has found them guilty essentially of treason, but I won’t be holding my breath.

Meanwhile, what remains to be done, of course, is to determine the fate of their Conspirator-in-Chief — he who remains free to spin new plots to this day. Ultimately, with his case it’s our democracy’s fate that hangs in the balance.

LINKS:

• Four Proud Boys members found guilty of seditious conspiracy (CNN)

• Former FBI supervisor arrested in connection with Jan. 6 riot (WP)

• America faces a debt nightmare (Economist)

• President Biden and Schumer must get to work to break the debt limit stalemate (The Hill)

• Yevgeny Prigozhin: Wagner Group boss says he will pull troops out of Bakhmut (BBC)

• Russia says U.S. was behind Kremlin drone attack, drawing quick denial (Reuters)

• Moscow Claims Explosions Above the Kremlin Were an Attempt to Kill Putin (NYT)

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy visited the International Criminal Court in The Hague, which in March issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Reuters)

• UN denounces Taliban intimidation, attacks on Afghan media (AP)

• Sudan’s generals stake claim to more territory ahead of latest cease-fire (WP)

• Death of unhoused N.Y.C. subway rider placed in chokehold ruled a homicide (Axios)

• Tennessee lawmakers react to Vanderbilt poll that shows growing support for gun control measures (NewsChannel5)

• Microsoft doubles down on AI with new Bing features —The company's betting the farm on generative AI (TechCrunch)

• Artificial intelligence is remixing journalism into a “soup” of language (Economist)

• AI investigated in UK over fears of domination (BBC)

• Bob Iger rebuilt Disney. Fighting DeSantis could define his legacy. (WP)

• How Sand Becomes Solar Panels (Cnet)

• Scientists Horrified as Sea Surface Temperatures Spike Off the Charts (Futurism)

• Animals Are Dying in Droves. What Are They Telling Us? (TNR)

• Lyft Is Facing an Existential Crisis (SF Standard)

• Three failed US banks had one thing in common: KPMG (Financial Times)

• Wuhan market samples fail to shed further light on COVID origins (Nature)

• Almost 258 million people faced acute food insecurity in 2022: UN (Al Jazeera)

• Campaign group teams with Hollywood to sharpen human rights focus (Guardian)

• The First Step to Solving the Housing Crisis Might Be Simpler Than You Think (Politico Mag)

• Area Man Having One Of His Little Bursts Of Energy Where He Tries To Write A Song (The Onion)

The Roots of Crime

 Although I will always be a defender of my fellow journalists and the hard work so many of them do so diligently, by the same token I will also always be a media critic.

And one of the issues that is chronically distorted in most media coverage is crime. The problem is that standard media crime coverage not only sensationalizes violent events, it often creates the impression that such events are rampant when they aren’t.

Don’t get me wrong, even one murder is too many, so there are way too many murders in our communities, but the rate of violent crime including homicides in most parts of the country is way down from historical levels.

You’d never know that from much of the media coverage, however. As I noted in my essay 'Awash in Crime?’ a few weeks ago, national coverage of the killing of tech executive Bob Lee portrayed the city of San Francisco as if its residents were enduring a rampage of violent crime, when in fact the opposite is true — there is a very low rate of violent crime in that city.

Lee’s death was a tragic, isolated event but people could be forgiven for thinking that San Francisco’s big issues like drug addiction, homelessness, poverty, mental illness, and property crimes were the cause of some (imaginary) tsunami of killings.

It’s not that the actual issues are not serious — they are — but media coverage obfuscates them in favor of sensationalism, and we all suffer from a distorted sense of reality as a result.

It is in that context that I recommend today’s top link — a report from KQED’s Alex Hall. This type of careful, detailed coverage brings out the gritty realities we need to confront, including the root causes of the actual violence plaguing our communities. 

The kind that rarely makes the headlines.

Think about it.

LINKS:

• A Teen Mother and Her Baby Were Murdered in a Gang-Related Shooting. Their Family Wants Answers (KQED)

• Clarence Thomas Had a Child in Private School. Harlan Crow Paid the Tuition. (ProPublica)

• Russia claims the U.S. is behind the alleged Ukrainian drone attack on the Kremlin (NBC)

• Death of man who was placed in chokehold on New York City subway ruled a homicide (CBS)

• Biden wants McConnell at the debt ceiling table, despite (or because of) their history (Politico)

• Jack Lew had a front-row seat to debt ceiling fights under Obama. Here's his advice (NPR)

• Is the Debt Limit Constitutional? Biden Aides Are Debating It. (NYT)

• Lawmakers throw cold water on short-term debt limit hike (The Hill)

• We’re pulling out the 2011 market playbook to navigate the current debt-ceiling debacle (CNBC)

• FTC Proposes Barring Meta From Monetizing Young Users’ Data (WSJ)

• US, Mexico agree on tighter immigration policies at border (AP)

• Fed raises interest rate 0.25 percentage point, but could be ready to pause (CBS)

• National test scores show decline in history and civics proficiency (Politico)

• Carlson’s Text That Alarmed Fox Leaders: ‘It’s Not How White Men Fight’ (NYT)

• Prosecutors near charging decision in Hunter Biden case (WP)

• Ukraine denies Russian claim Kyiv sent drones to hit Kremlin (AP)

• Spike in Russian combat deaths fuels fears of worse carnage to come (WP)

• "It begins": Wagner Group leader says Ukrainian Armed Forces launch offensive (Ukrayinska Pravda)

• Poland and Germany: the feud at the heart of Europe (Financial Times)

• Shipping Giant Maersk Drops Deep Sea Mining Investment (WSJ)

• VIDEO: ‘No Contracts, No Scripts,’ Hollywood Writers Begin Strike (AP, Reuters)

• UN chief says ‘not the right time’ to engage with Taliban (Al Jazeera)

• 'Godfather of AI' says AI could kill humans and there might be no way to stop it (CNN)

• China's AI industry barely slowed by US chip export rules (Reuters)

• As Writers Strike, AI Could Covertly Cross the Picket Line (Hollywood Reporter)

• Researchers See Through a Mouse's Eyes by Decoding Brain Signals (Gizmodo)

• Lyft’s CEO defends laying off 1,100 employees as a way to keep prices down and pay drivers more: ‘We want to be in line with where Uber is’ (AP)

• Stripe, a longtime partner of Lyft, signs a big deal with Uber (TechCrunch)

• The number of tech workers in the Bay Area slated to be laid off in 2023 has already exceeded the number of people in tech who were cut in 2022. (Mercury News)

• Nordstrom is the latest retailer to leave San Francisco (CNN)

• Virologist investigates Huanan seafood market's SARS-CoV-2 origins: Unexpected genetic connections revealed (Medical.net)

• The most mysterious forests on Earth are underwater — Kelp forests are majestic, life-sustaining ecosystems. Climate change imperils them. (Vox)

• Modern humans migrated into Europe in 3 waves, 'ambitious and provocative' new study suggests (LiveScience)

• Updated college football Top 25 Power Rankings: Spring edition (ESPN)

• Woman Tragically Succumbs To Natural Hair Color (The Onion)

Social Connections

 In the early days and weeks of the pandemic, I posted daily essays on my personal Facebook page, where my modest network of friends and family quickly ballooned to the site limit of 5,000. My sense was that the actual size of the potential audience for that work was many times that number, but there was no practical way to break through the ceiling established by Mr. Zuckerberg and friends.

I was writing mainly about the dangers of isolation and loneliness that the social distancing necessitated by the pandemic would inevitably lead to — and the strategies we might use to counter those dangers.

That the essays resonated with others, most of whom were strangers, encouraged me to keep going. It was my way of trying to provide a social service to anyone who wanted to receive it.

But, of course, as any social worker, counselor, minister or teacher could have reminded me, doing what I did was providing a major benefit to me in return. I felt like I was connecting with people day after day, thereby helping to break down the growing isolation and loneliness I myself felt from the social restrictions we had to endure.

That loneliness was compounded by my recent retirement and a long, slow recovery from a stroke, among other heath problems. But those were hardly issues unique to me. Over and over again, thinking of the pandemic period to come, I found myself composing the phrase in my head, “isolation can kill as surely as the virus.”

Those words came back to me this week when the U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy, warned that loneliness has reached emergency levels in this country, and that the only solution is for all of us to seek greater social connection.

What follows is an excerpt from an essay I published on Facebook in May 2020, as the pandemic began to rage and the future seemed especially dark. It still feels relevant three years later:

The latest numbers indicate that about 80 percent (4 in 5) of Covid-19 deaths are of people over the age of 65. But that group only accounts for roughly 20 percent (1 in 5) of the total amount of cases.

This is a stark reminder that the pandemic is killing off our elders in disproportionate numbers. To many, this is logical. As people age, they get weaker, develop chronic health problems, and become more susceptible to infections.

Many older people also become calmer, less given to emotional outbreaks, and more or less philosophical about the future. So they are less likely to panic in the face of the pandemic.

These are gross generalizations from my year-long journey through America's health-care system. Most of my fellow patients were elderly. Once they'd improved or stabilized enough to go to a skilled nursing facility, they started physical therapy treatments to regain lost functions.

Next, in the assisted living facilities, you encounter a wide mix of residents. Some live independent lives, dressing themselves, showering, taking their medications, exercising daily, and ordering any food they want for delivery. They can make it to the dining room for meals and to activity rooms for games, lectures and other social activities.

Others are in various states of decline; they need help with one or more of these physical tasks. The worst case, physically, is when a person can no longer do anything on their own.

Mental health is another track. Everyone gets a bit absent-minded with age, except the occasional ones who claim to recall every detail from their youth. There is the possibility that this is true; there is the possibility that this is a delusion. No one is around any longer to contest their claim.

The memory care unit is perhaps the saddest place in any of these facilities. That's where they take the people who can't remember much of anything or anybody any longer.

Nothing I'm saying here should surprise anybody, but it is what I witnessed personally. It can be a surreal period of life to be lost in the elderly care world. The nurses and CNAs and other care-givers are almost universally kind people, generous with their empathy and expressions of support. Little improvements in your performance are greeted by cheers from them -- you know they are on your side.

The reason I am revisiting all of this is that I know that isolation makes every stage of this journey worse for the vast majority of elderly people, and isolation kills as surely as the virus. If you have loved ones in your life, remember that and reach out to them as frequently as you can. Remind them that you love them.

LINKS:

• US surgeon general warns of next public health priority: loneliness (Guardian)

• Russia claims Ukraine tried to assassinate Putin in drone attack on the Kremlin (NBC)

• The World Awaits Ukraine’s Counteroffensive (Atlantic)

• The 'stunning' scale of Russian deaths in Ukraine signals trouble ahead for Putin (NBC)

• Ukrainian units have ousted Russian forces from some positions in Bakhmut amid fierce battles, a top Ukrainian general said. (Reuters)

• Biden administration approves sending 1,500 US troops to Mexico border as Title 42 deadline looms (Fox)

• 'He raped you,' friend of E. Jean Carroll testifies she said after alleged Trump attack (ABC)

• Speaker McCarthy accepts Biden's invitation to debt ceiling meeting (NBC)

• House Democrats Try to Force Vote on Debt Ceiling (WSJ)

• Montana state Rep. Zooey Zephyr (D) filed a lawsuit to return to the state House floor after the GOP censured her last week for speaking out against legislation that limits health care for trans youth. [HuffPost]

• Schools are canceling student shows with LGBTQ characters (WP)

• Supreme Court Takes Up Case That Could Curtail Agency Power to Regulate Business (NYT)

• The potential gift tax implications of Clarence Thomas’s luxury trips (The Hill)

• AI Is Tearing Wikipedia Apart (Vice)

• We need to bring consent to AI  (TR)

• U.S. military is tracking another mysterious balloon (NBC)

• Leaders of Sudan’s warring factions agree to seven-day ceasefire, South Sudan says (CNN)

• The United Nations warned that the conflict in Sudan could force 800,000 people to flee the country as battles between rival military factions persisted in the capital despite a supposed ceasefire. (Reuters)

• Xi Jinping Can’t Handle an Aging China (FA)

• Late-Night Shows To Shut Down Immediately After Writers Guild Strike Called (Deadline)

• Ominous New Report Just Lists Places To Hide (The Onion)

Careers.2 (Transitions)

Yesterday, I republished an old essay from 2006 that summarized most of my journalism career up to that point, although it omitted any mention of most of the jobs I held during the first decade, or the specific details of my years at the Center for Investigative Reporting, or for that matter, even at Rolling Stone.

So, although it was fairly detailed, the article barely covered half of my 57-year career to this point, including nothing from the very eventful past 17 years. This last chunk included bouncing from job to job for 7 years in both the private sector (mainly startups) and the non-profit sector.

It also included a long stretch back at KQED, the large public media company in Northern California, where I headed the digital news team, which built up a very large web-based audience, as well as managing many other reporters, including many of those doing investigative projects.

Finally, yesterday’s piece didn’t cover the past three-plus years since I “retired,” which has unleashed the greatest volume of daily essays I have ever produced on a sustained basis — somewhere around 1,000 new and an additional 100 refurbished pieces, like yesterday’s.

What I m saying here is that my career has had so many nooks and crannies that I can barely keep track of them all. If I were a pro athlete, and some franchise wanted to retire my jersey, it would be very hard to say which team it should be chosen from.

All of these transitions I made kept me on edge over the most intense 50 of those years, as I moved from job to job, meeting new people and confronting new challenges. I had to learn new systems over and over, as well as how to fit into a wide variety of work cultures.

But when I wasn’t too dizzy from all of the constant change, I developed a lot of sympathy for the many people I met along the way who lost their livelihoods and had to search for a new way to get by.

That’s the point of today’s post. Transitions can often be rough but they also can bring new excitement to our work lives. For anyone out there in between jobs, don’t give up and don’t lose hope. The next big thing for you may be just around the corner.

LINKS:

• US could default on its debt as soon as June 1 if Congress doesn’t act, Yellen says (CNN)

• 7 bodies found during search for missing Oklahoma teens (AP)

• The suspect in a Texas mass shooting vanishes, and authorities have 'zero leads' (NBC)

• Illinois interstate crash involving 72 vehicles leaves six dead, more than 30 injured: 'Horrific' (Fox)

• After Quitting Google, ‘Godfather of AI’ Is Now Warning of Its Dangers (Gizmodo)

• Elon Musk and others may try, but controlling AI is an impossible mission (MarketWatch)

• AI makes non-invasive mind-reading possible by turning thoughts into text (Guardian)

• Companies adopting AI need to move slowly and not break things (Fast Company)

• Judge denies Trump’s motion for mistrial in battery case (CNN)

• MAGA Is Ripping Itself Apart — The extremism, aggression, and lack of restraint in MAGA world are spreading. (Atlantic)

• The right’s demonization of campus diversity, equity and inclusion programs must end (The Hill)

• Dominion wants ‘accountability’ over Fox News election lies, co-founder says (Guardian)

• First Republic Bank Is Seized, Sold to JPMorgan in Second-Largest U.S. Bank Failure (WSJ)

• Are greedy corporations causing inflation? (Economist)

• How Gen Z Changed Its Views On Gender (Time)

• Russia launches second pre-dawn missile attack in three days (BBC)

• The Vatican is involved in a peace mission to try to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Pope Francis said. (Reuters)

• UN holds crucial Afghanistan talks in Qatar, without Taliban (Al Jazeera)

• Biden administration to let Afghan evacuees renew temporary legal status amid inaction in Congress (CBS)

• “In hot, poor countries, life will be short, and wars will be long” - why civil conflict is becoming more complex (Economist)

• The world’s best rainforest guardians already live there (WP)

• In San Francisco, a Troubled Year at a Whole Foods Market Reflects a City’s Woes (NYT)

• A crisis of care is quickly unfolding in Idaho, where near-total abortion bans carry harsh criminal penalties for physicians. Doctors, now unable to provide care, are fleeing the state. "Scary is an understatement," said one. [HuffPost]

• Why are Americans shooting strangers and neighbors? ‘It all goes back to fear.’ (WP)

• Americans fault news media for dividing nation: AP-NORC poll (AP)

• Marjorie Taylor Greene claims the lack of tax raises during ice age proves climate change is a hoax (Independent)

• 'A tragedy that makes you laugh': HBO's 'White House Plumbers' revisits Watergate (NPR)

• Willie Nelson inhales the love at 90th birthday concert (AP)

• Man Not Accepting Any More Television Recommendations At This Time (The Onion)

 

Careers

 (Note: I first published this retrospective in 2006. My mood hasn’t changed much over the 17 years since then.)

One October day 35 years ago, I drove an old Chevy van up Fell Street to the Fillmore in San Francisco, and resumed my journalism career after a two year hiatus in the Peace Corps. A small group of us started a magazine called SunDance at 1913 Fillmore Street. It was a large-format magazine, with big graphics and long articles on the intersection of post-Sixties politics and culture.

Actually, it was pure-Sixties in its sensibility; we just didn't know yet that that era was finished. SunDance had an impressive list of writers and artists, none more famous than John Lennon and Yoko Ono, who also gave us some money. When they came to visit the office and share stimulants with us, we knew we'd been blessed by the gods. 

Alas, none of us knew what a business plan was, and SunDance lasted all of three issues, though glorious issues they were. A few years later, I landed across town at Rolling Stone, at 625 Third Street, where celebrities of every stripe poured through the office, and the stimulation never ended. Not being a music writer, I rarely hung out with musicians, but a small group of us formed an ad-hoc investigative unit on staff there, and we did some good work until the founder, Jann Wenner, decided to move the operation to New York.

Some of us left behind then started a non-profit, the Center for Investigative Reporting, and our first real office was in the Broadway Building in downtown Oakland. Financing ourselves by a combination of foundation grants and contracts with media outlets, we produced newspaper series, magazine articles, books, television and radio documentaries (and eventually, long after I left, articles on the web).

I resumed my magazine career, now as an editor, 12 years later, becoming bureau chief for California magazine. We did some big stories there, too, but our Australian owner shut us down without warning one day; and two days later I was named Investigative Editor at Mother Jones. We did a lot of good stories over the next two years there, but it came time for me to leave, even though I wasn't sure where I would go next.

My old friend Raul Ramirez came to the rescue. He was leaving his post at KQED-FM for six months to go to Harvard as a Nieman Fellow, and asked me if I would fill in for him. This was my first taste of public radio news, one of the best venues a journalist could find, and I truly loved it there.

When Raul came back, I was ready to jump to the newspaper business, but the president of KQED made me an offer I couldn't refuse, so I moved "upstairs," bought some suits, and became an instant executive. Another half-year and I was named Executive Vice President for KQED Inc. It was a bit gnarly upstairs, but I enjoyed this new work, including an extremely long, slow negotiation with the union representing the station's technical workforce. It was both the details and the big picture of helping run a company important in our community that attracted me at that point in my life.

This job came to a sudden end, however -- another transition I didn't see coming. 

Meanwhile, a group of reporters headed by a friend, David Talbot, had quit the Examiner to try and start a web-based magazine, to be called Salon Magazine. David asked me to join them, mainly as a business consultant, so I did for three months that fall until we had managed to raise enough money and conclude a big marketing deal with Borders Books to be able to launch.

Then, I got a call from HotWired, the online offshoot of Wired magazine, founded by Louis Rossetto and Jane Metcalf. Would I like to become a producer for a new daily political website called The Netizen?

You bet. I was getting a little tired of the business side, which, though fascinating in its own right, can't compete with the thrill of creating content. We launched The Netizen in a few weeks, and for the next six months I presided over a chaotic product that really was the brainchild of Louis Rossetto, though he spent his days editing his magazine, not producing content on the web.

Louis and I clashed over the politics of the site. He's a brilliant iconoclast, a libertarian, a former college Republican. (When I was in college, I was a radical anti-war and civil rights activist, and arrested on occasion.) But somehow we enjoyed the intellectual fight we found ourselves conducting, at least most of the time.

But I didn't know what to think when he called me to his office one day; maybe I'd crossed a line and was going to be fired. Nope. He asked me to become the head of content for HotWired, which meant overseeing multiple websites, and many people on the front edge of what Louis called a digital revolution. This was not hyperbole.

But his vision for his company was seriously inflated. We tried to go public twice and failed. Not long after that, the investors took over the company, and booted most of us, including Louis, out.

This transition turned out to be a bit more difficult. I did some consulting, but nothing really seemed to jell. Then, Talbot called and asked me to come back to Salon, now a daily news website that was finding its voice covering the scandals engulfing the Clinton presidency. He asked me to do several jobs -- news editor, investigative editor, senior executive. 

Whatever. Being me, I said yes, though doing so meant I had to turn down two big consulting gigs that had taken months to land. Being at Salon the second time was a lot more fun, at least initially, because I got back to my investigative journalism roots, now as an editor, and was able to hire the best factchecker around, Daryl Lindsay, to join me there.

Our biggest hit was the Henry Hyde story, written by Talbot, edited by a bunch of us, and promoted by all. (Before that story was published, I checked with the deans of prominent journalism programs about the ethics of our decision, and was assured we were on solid ground. This helped later when we were subjected to a barrage of media criticism, as well as death threats, bomb threats, etc.)

Salon aimed to go public, too, and eventually did, thanks to its principal financial backer, Mr. Hambrecht. But, as part of becoming a publicly-traded company (briefly, as it turns out, since the company would be delisted during the dot.bust), my own role there changed. Daryl and I ended up opening a Washington, D.C., office for Salon in summer 1999.

A year later, I was back in the Bay Area, at Excite@Home, where I was managing a large staff of producers, writers, designers, and editors.

Talk about the dot.bust! Excite@Home was doomed, though it took some months before I could allow myself to recognize that sad truth.

After that disaster, a Midwestern couple much after my own taste, Tom and Heather Hartle, moved here from Michigan and asked me to help them launch 7X7, a new city magazine for San Francisco. We launched -- to some fanfare -- a week before the 9/11 attacks. New York's economy was injured; San Francisco's tourist-based economy essentially collapsed. That also ended the minor economic recovery from dot.bust around here, and sent me out in search of a new job, yet again.

But not before we had created some great issues of 7X7. In the spring of 2002, I accepted a one-to-three-year visiting professor position at Stanford, where (until 2005) I kept a close eye on how the collision between journalism and digital technology was unfolding. Nine months ago, I rejoined the private-sector fray, at a start-up, where we are exploring the new lexicon of content surfacing, categorization, and interactivity with user-created content.

Along the way, over the years, there have been too many other projects to list, but recent ones include teaching memoir-writing to boomers; acting as the interim managing editor for the Stanford Social Innovation Review; guest-editing at Business 2.0; working as an investigator for the victim families of 9/11; serving as interim editorial director at CIR; editing some investigative articles post 9/11 for The Nation; guest editing a special issue of BIG magazine on SF (a very special launch party for which I will describe later ); and helping various journalists on special projects, as well as a number of entrepreneurs on start-ups.

In the more distant past was a decade of screenwriting and consulting in Hollywood, plus 14 years of teaching at U-C, Berkeley's journalism school. For many years, I also traveled internationally and spoke at conferences, mostly about global environmental problems. During all this time, I tried to balance the journalistic requirement to remain aloof from direct activism with my penchant to be involved in my communities in every way possible. Not an easy act to master, and I don't think I did it all that well most of the time.

This long, unpredictable voyage has as much been a private search for my writing voice as a "career," i.e., finding ways to support my family, and therefore, to be a productive member of our society, as opposed to what else I might otherwise have turned into. 

That same quest continues in this space, unabated. At this point, all I really wish to do is write.

LINKS:

• House GOP Whip Tom Emmer declines to outright guarantee U.S. will not default on its debts (USA Today)

• What is the US debt ceiling and what will happen if it is not raised? (Guardian)

• House majority whip rejects idea that GOP debt bill is doomed (Politico)

• Here’s What Treasury, Fed Might Do in a Debt Ceiling Crisis (WSJ)

• Ron DeSantis’s Orwellian Redefinition of Freedom (Atlantic)

• Ron DeSantis F-cked With the Wrong Fandom (Rolling Stone)

• Tucker Carlson and the Right (New Yorker)

• Report shows just how bad traffic is in SF with Uber, Lyft (SFGate)

• ChatGPT and its ilk are still "fake" intelligence (Salon)

• The next level of AI is approaching. Our democracy isn’t ready. (WP)

• The 'Don't Look Up' Thinking That Could Doom Us With AI (Time)

• Sperm-injecting robot achieves a baby-making breakthrough, 2 girls born (IE)

• Sudan’s Conflict Ignites Fears of Civil War in Darfur (NYT)

• Russia’s Wagner mercenary force boss threatens Bakhmut withdrawal (Al Jazeera)

• Japan's Shrinking Population Faces Point of No Return (Newsweek)

• Islamic State Khorasan Province Is a Growing Threat in Afghanistan and Beyond (Diplomat)

• What do Mormons believe? (CNN)

• Gas leaf blowers and lawn mowers are shockingly bad for the planet. Bans are beginning to spread. (USA Today)

• Could AI save the Amazon rainforest? (Guardian)

• ‘Legendary’: Steph Curry scores record 50 points in Golden State Warriors’ playoff win over Sacramento Kings (CNN)

• In Praise of the Long Movie (New Yorker)

• Lazy Poor Person Has Never Earned Passive Income From Stock Dividends A Day In His Life (The Onion)

Weekend Reads

 LINKS:

• Russia blames drone attack for Crimea fuel depot blaze (Al Jazeera)

• On Thursday, Lyft’s new CEO laid off over 1,000 employees. On Friday he ordered remaining ones back to the office (Fortune)

• Uber Rival Lyft Takes Drastic Action (The Street)

• Montana Governor Signs Law Banning Transgender Care for Minors (NYT)

• Biden v Trump: US is unenthused by likely rematch of two old white men (Guardian)

• Trump Lawyer Fell Into 'Trap' Amid E. Jean Carroll Trial: Ex U.S. Attorney (Newsweek)

• Bed Bath & Beyond, Toys ‘R’ Us and RadioShack all shut down for the same reason (CNN)

• Big Tech Earnings Spark Hope That Worst Is Over (WSJ)

• Will a Chatbot Write the Next ‘Succession’? (NYT)

• How A.I. could change the future of work (CNBC)

• OpenAI closes $300M share sale at $27B-29B valuation (TechCrunch)

• Former OpenAI Researcher: There’s a 50% Chance AI Ends in 'Catastrophe' (Decrypt)

• Is time up for TikTok? (Economist)

• Jane Roberts, who is married to Chief Justice John Roberts, made $10.3 million in commissions from elite law firms, whistleblower documents show (Insider)

• As fentanyl crisis grows, U.S.-Mexico divide deepens (WP)

• Federal judge blocks Illinois assault weapons ban (The Hill)

• Gunman killed neighbors, child with AR-15-style rifle, sheriff says (WP)

• Denied a Gun License Over School Threat, Accused Leaker Jack Teixeira Later Got Top-Secret Clearance (WSJ)

• Homeless in the City Where He Was Once Mayor (NYT)

• Taliban not invited to UN Doha meeting on Afghanistan, says UN (Reuters)

• Women’s rights at stake as India’s population surpasses China’s (NBC)

• Principal forced to resign over Michelangelo's David visits sculpture (BBC)

• Man Tinkering With Anecdote Set List Before Next Date (The Onion)