It's Good For You

     Tam's been fighting a cold and yesterday, it was pretty bad.  So I made chicken soup.

     Thursday is Trash Night, when we change all the litter boxes, gather up all the trash, and get it out to the curb for Friday morning pickup.  We usually order pizza, to avoid time spent cooking and cleaning up the kitchen.  To make matters worse, I worked over.

     But canned chicken soup is--  Well, it's good enough and some brands are better.  Still, for full effect, home made chicken soup is best.

     I compromised.  The neighborhood grocer had diced fresh white onion in deli containers, about a third of a cup, and snack-sized celery right next to it.  A small bag of baby carrots rounded out the vegetables.  They had nice, big chicken drumsticks in the hot deli counter, too, so I got four of them.  Noodles were going to be time-consuming, but Pacific brand chicken soup has lots of nice, broad noodles.  I picked up a 16-ounce can of soup and an eight-ounce container of chicken broth.

     Once home, I didn't want to fiddle around too much.  I heated up about a teaspoon of good olive oil in the medium stock pot, dumped the onion in and gave it a couple of shakes to coat.  The baby carrots were skinny enough to snip with kitchen shears right over the pot (no cutting board!) and once they were in and cooking, I gave the celery the same treatment.  I followed with the chicken.  It's a little tricky, but the meat snips right off, skin and all.  By the time I finished the last one. the onion was translucent and the carrots and celery had brightened up.  I poured the can of soup over, added the broth, put in a shake of Bragg's seasoning mix, gave it a stir, put the lid on and went about setting up for supper.  Ten minutes later, we were enjoying big, hearty bowls of not quite homemade chicken soup, loaded with fresh vegetables and roasted chicken.

     No, it's not as quick as using the phone or computer to summon food.  It's not as quick as opening a can and heating it up.  But it's not that much slower, and it's better for you.  It's a lot faster than doing the whole thing from scratch, and while I didn't simmer the broth down for hours, the profit-minded hippies at the soup company did, or at least used some process with the same end result.  And the deli roasts chicken as well as anyone.  If I'd had more time, I would have thrown the drumsticks in whole for a half hour, then taken the meat off and put the bones back in to simmer with the broth; but sometimes you have to choose your degree of difficulty and the end result was a healing treat on a busy night.

"What's In The Box?"

     The title of this post is a line from Dune.  The young hero (or is he?) Paul is about to undergo a test meant, "To determine if you're human," if he can deal rationally with fear.  What's in the box is pain.

     America's economy -- the global economy -- has been handed a box, too.  We don't know what's in it.  The President and his advisors who devised our new tariffs say it's full of wonders.  Many highly-qualified economists say it's full of pain.  The history of tariffs is, at best, alarming; the Smoot-Hawley tariffs didn't cause the Great Depression, but the general consensus is they made it worse.

     What's in the box?  We'll find out -- and you can bet none of the higher-ups in Washington will feel any pain, including the spineless Congress that has, once again, dodged responsibility by handing the Executive a power, in this case taxation, normally reserved to the Legislative branch.  The power to declare war, they abrogated that long ago; the power to make laws is ebbing, what with Executive Orders now being treated as if they were laws; impoundment of allocated funds and the imposition of "emergency" tariffs cede the power of the purse.

     Anyone with an eye to Classical history can tell you that the Emperor of Rome didn't spring forth full-fledged, but by the gradual accretion of powers and responsibilities once held by the Senate and people of Rome and their various Executives to the office of Emperor.  The framers of the U. S. Constitution were wary of such a thing happening in their new republic, and did their best to hedge against it.  Did they do enough?

     What's in the box?

Quick Dinner

     Last night, I wanted something easy for supper.  I'd had a lousy day and I didn't have much energy.  Our corner grocery often has fresh vegetables and a basic seasoning, bagged up and ready to microwave.  Last night, their "mixed vegetables with Tuscan butter" was front and center, a collection of green and yellow zucchini, pea pods, broccoli, cauliflower, onion, asparagus and shredded carrots with a dollop of seasoned butter.  There's a bit over a pound per bag.

     It's a good assortment and "Tuscan" had me thinking.  I picked up a container of fresh cherry tomatoes, a 16-oounce container of quality red sauce (Michael's of Brooklyn "Homestyle Gravy," which we here in the Midwest know as spaghetti sauce with everything, the full garden of vegetables, cooked down) and a little under a pound of mild Italian sausage.

     This is not the cheapest collection of stuff, but it's still far less than dining out or ordering in.  I browned and drained the sausage with some extra spices, adding a generous double-handful of chopped cherry tomatoes after draining.  I ran the bagged vegetables in the microwave while that cooked, adding the sauce to the meat and tomatoes after a few minutes.  With the pan bubbling, I put in the vegetables (leaving any excess melted seasoned butter in the bag), covered it and let it simmer for a few more minutes -- but not long enough for the vegetables to get mushy.

     The end result has enough sauce to coat everything but not drown the other ingredients.  You could have it over pasta if you wanted to, but we didn't.  Tam even went back for seconds!  Total time was around fifteen minutes and it will easily serve four or five adults.  We had leftovers.

In Which I Address Fools

     An unpublished commenter has chided me. "The right to an education isn't a real right," they claim, leading into a basic explanation of the difference between positive rights (requiring some action on the part of others) and negative rights (requiring only that others refrain from interfering).

     It's all stuff no one who was awake and paying attention over the last 30-odd years could have possibly missed, especially if they inclined to libertarian or even conservative views.  It's also not the point.  Free public schools exist; our taxes fund them.  Speaking as a childless homeowner (Indiana school funding comes from property taxes), I would just as soon live in a world with fewer ignorant children left with plenty of idle time to get up to trouble and I'll pay money to get it.  Like it or not, free universal public education through Grade 12 is how it works.

     If Billy, who was born here but whose parents came from elsewhere and Ramon, who was born here and whose ancestors came here before the Civil War, one of them on the Mayflower, both get a free education, but Billy's big sister Daphne, who was born in the old country before Mumsie and Daddy sneaked across the Canadian frontier, does not, that's pretty plainly bullshit -- especially when Vladimir and Valerie, children of legal immigrants, one born in Undershirtistan and the other here, both attend the same public schools, free for nothing.

     One of the biggest problems with this exclusion is it amounts to punishment of a child for the offenses of their parents -- while Billy and Daphne's parents are presumably still some sort of scofflaws,* little Daphne had no choice in the matter.  In Indiana, this is known as "corruption of the blood," and our state Constitution specifically forbids it.  You can lecture me about it all day, but it's still there, in black and white.  It's got antecedents that go right back to the Old Testament, for that matter.
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* Or possibly not; there are a number of paths, now and in the past, that might let 'em stay here under various sorts of residency.  And just how a law barring children of "illegals" from public education might apply to those situations is unknown and untested.  It's nice that attorneys have a chance to earn a living finding this stuff out, but we don't owe them the opportunity.

Up For Debate

     If your rights are up for debate, they're not being recognized as inalieneable; the debaters do not think those rights are inherent.

     In Tennessee, there's a bill under consideration that would deny children in this country illegally the right to a public education.  ICE is conducting operations based on the notion that anyone in the country illegally is not entitled to due process of law -- and that they can"illegalize" anyone in the country on a student visa or "green card" simply by claiming they pose a threat to public safety or national security (or if they are found to have engaged in criminal activity or fraud).  Laws and Executive Orders in multiple states have barred adults changing the sex or gender marker on their ID -- and this applies not just to they/them boogeypersons with unusually-colored hair but to people like the late computer scientist Lynn Conway and electronic music pioneer Wendy Carlos.  Bear in mind that "Real ID" driver's licenses and State ID cards require this information, and you'll soon need one just to board a passenger flight.

     All of these are examples of people whose rights are being debated -- not just in public forums but in legislatures and governmental executive offices, and while it is problematic in and of itself, if the rights of some group are questioned, the rights of everyone are under question, too.

     Within my lifetime, a single woman had difficulty opening a bank account, getting a credit card or buying a house; a married woman had to have her husband's consent, even to open an account solely in her own name.  Within the lifetimes of my grandmothers, women could not vote.

     When the rights of one subset of people are up for grabs, everyone's rights can be.  Maybe you believe you're safe.  Maybe you are -- but you'd be a lot safer if your inalienable rights were genuinely protected from the grubby paws of partisan politicians, stirring up division in search of power, and the only way that works is if those rights apply to everyone -- whitebread types happy near the statistical mean, weirdos, freaks, foreigners and criminals, even people who didn't vote for the same politicians you chose.

Gone Too Soon

     Henry Petroski, the unofficial poet laureate of engineering, left us in 2023, leaving the world considerably better off from his many books -- and considerably poorer by his absence.

     A wonderful writer, witty and accessible, he gave detailed attention to many of the things most of us take for granted, from pencils to paperclips to bookshelves to bridges, and explained why they worked and who made them work.  I am sorry not to have noted his passing when it happened.  Have a look at his books.  You won't regret it.

Beans And Rice

     Most of the people I know do not like beans and rice-based meals nearly as much as I do.  For me, it's comfort food.

     For most of my early adult life, I didn't make much money -- but I had the advantage of only working forty hours a week.  If you're low on money, you can still eat well if you have time to cook, though it took me a couple of years to figure that out.  Dried beans and rice are cheap, filling and take time to make.  If you've got more to spend, you add more stuff -- fresh vegetables, meat and so on.  If money's tight, dry spices are inexpensive and store well.

     So beans and rice means I'm doing okay.  A little money, a little free time.  During the stretch when I was working two full-time jobs, I ate fast food, cheap ramen, hot dogs -- and splurged on peanut butter and jelly or bacon and eggs occasionally.  When my wages have outrun inflation, which has happened a few times, though it never lasts, I eat better, but money-saving habits persist.  I freeze leftovers, try to plan meals to fit what's already in the fridge or on the shelf.  And I'm never without a little "just in case" stock of rice and beans.

Playing Their Game

     Outrage -- reaction.  Shock -- reaction.  Blow past limits -- reaction.

     That's the game.  Every day, a new bad thing -- or three, or four.  Even ostensible errors work for them.  And anyone invested in norms, in stability, in lawful, orderly liberty is left off-balance, struggling to keep up.

     I could write about one of the most recent, a harebrained scheme to essentially flash-migrate the Social Security Administration's vast codebase (and the database it manipulates) off ancient, crusty COBOL and the machines it runs on over to something newer, sleeker and supposedly better, but I don't know if I can share just how big a nightmare it is, especially since DOGE code kiddies have already demonstrated hat they don''t even begin to understand COBOL and all the tricks and cruft it takes to make it work.  Informed speculation claims they're going to use AI to get it done -- you know, the same AI that still can't get the right number of fingers on pictures of people.

     But it's only one shock among many, and that is the point: shock and awe.  Blitzkrieg.  Storm in, tear stuff up high, wide and mighty, leave it screwed up until people don't think it it will ever work again, then patch together some cheapjack mess that kind of runs and claim to have saved the day -- though we're nowhere near the "slap up a crappy replacement and play for applause" stage yet, and there's always the risk the trick won't actually work.

     And through it all, attention, attention, attention.  The newsies say the President's name hundreds of times a day, all the nations of the world watch to see where his (and his staff's) whim will fall next, a planned tariff there, a proposed annexation elsewhere....  It'll make your head spin, and it's supposed to.  It's supposed to keep you so off guard you don't notice rights and freedoms ebbing away -- people are grabbed off the street by masked law enforcement, held without recourse to counsel, jailed without trial.  Law firms are being made to bend the knee to the Executive Branch, officials dismissed without following Congressionally-required procedures, and everywhere, the heavy hand of authoritarianism is descending.

     This isn't the America I learned about in Civics class.  And it's not like we weren't warned.

It Couldn't Be Real

     Surely it was "black propaganda" video (alternative) worthy of a modern-day Sefton Delmer: Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem warning people to not enter the U. S. illegally -- which is okay-fine, that's part of her remit -- in front of an El Salvadoran jail cell crowded shoulder-to-shoulder with shaven-headed, shirtless men, presumably deportees.  That part is shocking.  It's a real "are we the good guys?" moment, especially considering these people did not get due process.  Hey, if they're criminals, charge 'em, run 'em through the courts, and if found guilty, make 'em serve their time (etc.).  If they sneaked in, deport them back to where they came from.  But indefinite jail time without trial, in a prison outside U. S. jurisdiction? That's not how civilized countries enforce their laws.

     Here's the thing: if the men in the video are deportees, they were shipped out under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which applies in times of war, and there are international standards for persons so imprisoned.  Among other restrictions, you don't get to use 'em as photo-op props.  If they're not deportees, they're just random El Salvadoran prisoners being used as props, a horrifying breach of civilized norms.

     This is Stalinesque stuff.  And it is for real.  Secretary Noem appears to be proud of it.  You can be for tough border control and enforcement without playing footsie with crimes against humanity, but this Administration doesn't care.  They're running up a bill we will all have to pay.  Maybe it'll be a punchline in 65 years.  Maybe not.

     Update: There are claims going around that this is a keyed-in background, that she's in front of a "green screen."  AP has raw video and nope, she's there and so are they.

Onward!

     All this excitement from Washington, DC and we're only 64 days in.  Three years and a little under ten months to go.  The only way through it is forward.

     I keep thinking about the story my mother told, of when she was in the hospital delivering me or my brother.  Back then, they still had wards, rows of beds with heavy curtains that could be drawn between them for a bare minimum of privacy.  Sound still traveled.  Somewhere in the maternity ward, a young woman was beginning labor with her husband beside the bed, alternating between complaining bitterly to him, "You did this to me!  You!" and sobbing.  Yes and no; they did it together, and presumably the result was around for a long, long time.

     And now here we are.

I Suppose I Should Comment

     The thing is, when top Federal intelligence and defense officials plan international military action:

A. Using their personal cellphones and not the secure means and methods OPSEC and general good practice require, and which Uncle Sam provides them at considerable effort and expense;

B. Via an inherently insecure commercial service;

C. In plain, clear language;

D. Having somehow inadvertently added a journalist to the group;

E. While one of the other members of the group is apparently in Moscow (and not the one in Idaho);

and

F. The Speaker of the House all but laughs it off as a little peccadillo, an oopsie that they'll learn from;

and

G. The President and his closest advisor do much the same;

     I got nothin'.  It's Amateur Hour and the grand prize is everybody's future.  This is an Executive Branch filled with thugs, nitwits, religious and pseudo-scientific kooks, racists and rigid ideologues.  Their incompetence may be their least appalling shortcoming.

     It will be a wonder if this bunch manages to avoid stumbling into another pandemic, a global depression, a world war or something unexpectedly worse.  They have already done irreparable harm to U.S. military and commercial alliances, our Defense industry and the useful functions of the Federal government.  There are 588 days until the midterms, 1,323 days until the next Presidental election and until then, we have got to get by with an Executive Branch that is not simply embracing a radically different political philosophy but is actively bad at their jobs; a largely supine Legislative Branch that only might toughen up after the 2026 elections, and a Judicial Branch with willing enablers larded through it from bottom to top.

     I'd like to have a clever comment.  I really would.  But all I can think is that there's nowhere to go when (or, with enormous good luck, only if) these clowns screw up even worse.  At least Casey Jones's fireman could judge the right moment to leap off the locomotive; at least the crew of a shot-up B-24 over WW II Europe could try to get out and parachute down.

Report Card Due

     The next set of U.S. GDP numbers will be released in a few days.  On March 27th, the Bureau of Economic Analysis will look back at 2024 and the numbers for the fourth quarter of that year.

     A month later, at the end of April, the earliest look at GDP for the first quarter of 2025 will be released.  This doesn't quite provide an apples-to-apples comparison, but it'll be numbers that can be held up side-by side.  There is one caveat: the Trump Administration plans to remove the kinds of government spending that are normally included in the formula, and I'm not sure if that's happening for the numbers to be released this month or if it will be introduced in April.

     It has never included some of the biggest chunks of "government money" -- transfer payments like Social Security don't go into the math.  But the government spending is not small; The U. S. went from -9.3% growth in four years under Herbert Hoover to +10.1% in twelve years under Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the huge bump comes from 1941 - 43: WW II spending.

     So we'll see what comes out, and what the pundits think it might mean.  BEA is filled with exactly the kinds of math, statistics and economist geeks you'd hope it would be, and they love to share their numbers.  There will be plenty to look at.

     (Speaking of GDP and industry, how many of you have read of Samuel Slater?  Oh, we all learned about Eli Whitney, who turned cotton -- and, somewhat inadvertently, slavery -- into an industry, but once you have the fiber, it's still got to be spun, and it was Slater who got the U. S. into the business of spinning on an industrial scale and helped fill New England with mills.)