Eric The Blue

The Supremes (not the ones who can carry a tune)

Lots of news, and my favorite nugget, possibly because it has nothing to do with the presidential campaign, concerns the Supreme Court of the Republican party. It took the Court a New York minute to rule that the 14th amendment's clause barring insurrectionists from holding elected office did not permit Colorado to keep Trump off its ballot. Meanwhile, it is dallying, and dallying and dallying, over the question of whether it's possible for a president to commit crimes. So hard! It should be safe to stop dallying now since Trump won’t be tried for attempting to reverse the result of the last presidential election until after the next presidential election occurs—and never, if Trump wins. The Court can rule anything now, because the goal of delaying the trial, and the airing of the evidence in the case, has been achieved.

Okay, all that does pertain to the campaign. I had in mind a couple other recent decisions. In Ohio v EPA, the Court allowed a "good neighbor" provision of the Clean Air Act to be put on hold while the suit of Ohio and some other "upwind states" is litigated. The details are varied and interesting, including the fact that the case came to the Court on the "shadow docket," an emergency application of parties that want to continue to pollute. Granted, and quickly decided in favor of the applicants! The detail that caught the attention of Chemistry 101 alums is that the 5-4 decision (boys against girls since Justice Barrett joined the liberals in dissent), written by Justice Gorsuch, refers repeatedly to "nitrous oxide," commonly known as laughing gas, a tool of dentists and anesthesiologists. Gorsuch meant to refer to "nitrogen oxide," a family of air pollutants under EPA control. 

I know, so what, you'd have to take an uber from science class to the part of the school curriculum where Gorsuch and his team of law clerks likely made their straight-A grades in the Ivy League. You might think these haughty nerds would do some proofreading and googling, but, whatever, the words are similar even if they refer to different things. The Court has now corrected the error in its official decision. Before the error was corrected, however, the Court issued another decision, in a case called Loper Bright v Raimondo, that had the effect of reversing a longstanding legal principle (the "Chevron doctrine") that gave federal regulatory agencies the power to interpret laws affecting their work. The Court now says, no, henceforth judges, not regulators, will decide what Congress meant. This will have the intended effect of making it a lot harder for government regulators to do their work. Scientists at the EPA, for example, will have to worry about the opinions of their overlords in the judiciary who don't know the difference between laughing gas and smog. 

Scylla and Charybdis

Luckily, one of my kids has a 6:30 piano lesson on Thursdays, after which we go out for hamburgers, so I turned on the debate just a few minutes before the protagonists began arguing about their golf games. Trump probably cheated his way to the recent "club championship" he bragged about, and Biden presumably was confusing his "6 handicap" with a 36 handicap. Perhaps a somewhat apt summary: the Lying Narcissist versus the Old Confused Guy. How hard would it have been for a half-wit, responding to Trump's "club championship," to say something like, "Ya, I guess you're a good golfer, and I've heard you have a lot of money, but it's weird how you think these are an adequate compensation for being a crook, an ignoramus, a blowhard, and an all-around piece-o'-shit human."

But Biden: "I have a 6 handicap!" Hard to believe that wasn't his worst moment but I defer to the unanimous opinion of people who subjected themselves to all 90 minutes.

The wise counsellors in Biden's inner circle: if they're so smart—and it appears they're smart enough to do a credible job of running the country—why didn't they tell him a few months ago that he had to retire? I suppose it's possible that they did and are just fighting an iron law of human frailty. Ballplayers: "When I lose a step, I'll be the first to know, and that's when I'm done." Justice Ginsburg: "Yes, I'm in my mid-80s, and have cancer in multiple body parts, but I really like my job." Biden: "Only I can beat Trump." All just slightly different flavors of something that should never be on a plate. 

As a somewhat partisan Democrat, I have to say that at least we're upset about our guy's infirmities. The other side seems to have no problem with:

Moderator: What are you going to do about the climate crisis?

Trump: Illegals are ruining America! Biden is the worst president ever!

Moderator: I asked about the climate.

Trump: Illegals are ruining America! By the way, I love the environment. Biden is the worst.

Moderator: Lots of families can't afford childcare. Do you have a plan to help them?

Trump: Did I mention that illegal migrants are ruining America? By the way, I did not have sex with Stormy Daniels.

Moderator: Question was about childcare.

Trump: I won the club championship. The illegals are stealing your social security.

"Flooding the zone with bullshit" is too pale a metaphor for his brand of blustery vacuity. Regarding the question of who he has or hasn't bedded, what even is the point of lying about something when everyone knows what the truth is? He's lied so much that it's now just a reflex. 

Downtown touristing

When you're 65, and you buy one of those Medicare supplemental plans, you can usually join a gym for free, though the one I joined limits the hours you can enter so that the buff people don't have to see what life has in store for them. 

Anyway, the path from my favorite downtown coffee shop to the gym in the Target Center takes me past First Avenue, where I often see people, probably tourists, taking pictures of themselves in front of one of the stars on the building facade.  The stars, around 400 of them, include the printed name of a band or performer that's played inside; the full list is here. I decided today that being local shouldn't stop you from paying homage. I went with Slim, partly because his star is too high up to accommodate a selfie, and who wants to see me? Also, I love him. Here is maybe his all-time best (name of the song is actually "Times Like This"):

 

Might from time to time pay tribute to another artist from the wall.

Willie Mays, 1931-2024

 

A little eye candy for some of my jillions of readers who may be wondering what all the fuss is about. He looks like he might have been an athlete, no?

I had the Twins on the radio when the news of his death became public. Announcer Dan Gladden, who came up in the Giants' organization, talked about all the times he spoke with Willie, how charming and brimming with baseball lore he was: cool, but it seemed like an odd way to talk about a guy who, on the morning of the day he died, was the only living person with a strong claim to being the greatest ballplayer ever. Who was a better hitter? Maybe the Babe, probably Ted Williams, possibly his National League contemporary Hank Aaron. But Mays's all-around game seems like it could put him ahead of these three, and I don't know who else should be considered. 

He had a lifetime batting average of .302 and hit 660 homers, yet in the few days since he died identifying the greatest catch he ever made has become a parlor game among fans. The leading candidate is the back-to-the-infield, over-the-shoulder grab of a drive hit into the deep recesses of the Polo Grounds cavernous centerfield during the 1954 World Series. It's so famous that the guy who hit the ball, Vic Wertz, is known for little else even though he was a 4-time all-star. If perhaps the World Series context unfairly elevates that one, there is at the other end of the spectrum a catch he made on May 7, 1951, while playing for the Minneapolis Millers in Nicollet Park. The locally famous Halsey Hall described it in the next morning's Minneapolis Tribune:

Willie Mays turned scoreboard boy. Off Taft Wright, in the third inning, the young genius looked like he was hanging up numbers as he leaped almost to the level of the big league board for a fly ball, banged into the wall, and doubled a runner at second base. It will rank as one of the greatest catches you ever will see. 

The guy for the rival Minneapolis Star wrote:

Mays in the third inning made the greatest catch anyone present could recall at Nicollet park. He literally climbed the right center field wall to pick off Taft Wright's jet drive. 

It was so nearly an impossible catch that Jim Piersall, Colonel runner on second base, took off and raced for the plate. He headed for the dugout instead of trying to get back to second and the double play was easy.

It happened that my dad was one of the 1351 fans in attendance that evening. According to him, the catch was remarkable because Mays "leaped," not from the ground, but from a place well up the high wall, which he climbed by digging his spikes into the wood. He then fell in a heap to the ground before getting up to throw to second base to complete the double play. 

Those two are probably the bookends of high- and low-profile outfield plays he made. Many, many more in the wide intermediate zone. It's harder to talk about his base running, but in the image of him I'll always retain he's sprinting between first and second base after hitting the ball over the rightfielder's head. His cap has fallen off, and he's looking over his right shoulder at the ball and the outfielder to decide whether to try for a triple. It was probably a triple. He hit 141 of them in his career and led the league in triples 3 times (4 times in home runs, notwithstanding the steady competition from, among others, Aaron). The math of 660 career homers is somewhat daunting—at 30 per year, it takes 22 years, so, like, from when you're 20 until you're 42. He had just turned 20 when the above picture was taken, and he made his major league debut about two weeks later. 

Don’t mix me up with this guy

I like to tell myself that I’m long past caring what anyone thinks about me, but yesterday, while playing around on this website, I discovered that someone with the name “Eric Jorgenson” contributes regularly to the political campaigns of such lowlifes as Gym Jordan and that senator-hillbilly guy who’d sell his soul for either ten cents or a job offer from Trump.

That Eric Jorgenson lives in Ohio. He’s a lawyer. Friends, it’s not me!

A big swing, another miss

In the misty past, before conservative politics had been degraded in America, one might have been attracted to conservatism by the stiff upper lip of its practitioners, their disinclination to fly off the handle or shriek about cloudy weather. Those days are long gone. John Hinderaker is a blogger, with a large following of nutcases, as well as the Grand Poobah of a think tank, Center of the American Experiment, that has apparently issued a "report" on the sorry state of the Minnesota economy. Here he is, on his blog, occasionally quoting his colleague, a supposed professional economist, as the rising voice and stentorian dismissals signal the conclusion to another unanswerable screed (emphasis in original):

Minnesota's decline has continued into 2024.

GDP per capita was lower in Minnesota than it was for the United States generally for the first time for which there is data available. In the 22 quarters for which we can calculate real GDP per capita growth rates, Minnesota lagged the United States in thirteen.

There you have it. What was once a prosperous state has been dragged down to below-average status by left-wing government. Let Minnesota's decline be a lesson to voters in every state who wonder whether they should elect Democrats.

The rhetorical strategy must be to distract attention from the thin gruel with hand waving. Minnesota lagged the country's GDP growth in 13 of 22 quarters? Is it safe then to infer that it grew more rapidly than the US in the other 9? Oh my, what a train wreck! The argument, if that is what you want to call it, made me curious about how the 50 states rank in per capita GDP. Here are the top 5: 

1. New York
2. Massachusetts
3. Washington
4. California
5. Connecticut

And the bottom 5:

46. Idaho
47. Alabama
48. Arkansas
49. West Virginia
50. Mississippi

All the data is here. Hard to comprehend how it qualifies as a recommendation of red-state policies.

Thoreau's dictum

One of them, anyway, is that most people "lead lives of quiet desperation."

I was watching the Twins the other evening—a least, the TV was on, though I was doing something else, probably wiping up the clumps of dog hair that collect where the floor meets the bottom of the wall, when I heard former Twin and current part-time color commentator Trevor Plouffe say something kind of poignant. I think someone had just made a good play because Trevor, his voice rising, exclaimed (I'm paraphrasing): "Man, I love this game! I don't think I've ever loved it as much as I do now! [Slight pause.] When you're playing, there's an everyday job aspect to it, and maybe a fair amount of anxiety connected to that. But now, man! What a play!"

Anxiety. I'm guessing he was speaking out of his own experience. Everyone thinks everyone else's life is perfect, but here's a guy in the Big Leagues, "living the dream," and he's unable to enjoy himself over much. It's not that hard to understand why this might be. The major league minimum salary is now $740,000. Meanwhile, minor leaguers, if they didn't sign a rich deal when they were teenagers, are apt to be in the position of schoolteachers working a job in the "off season" to augment the modest income derived from their professional career. To say nothing of the difference between, on the one hand, long bus rides ending at a Red Roof Inn and, on the other, chartered flights, nice hotels, and a generous per diem ($117.50 per day if the club does not provide meals). Then there are considerations related to MLB's Player Pension Plan—you get 2.5% of the way to the maximum benefit for every 43 days you're on an MLB roster. The pressure on a marginal player to stay in the majors is intense, but it's hard to swing it good when you're grinding the bat handle to saw dust. 

The guys you're going against are mostly either a little better than you or in a situation that resembles yours. The pressure seeps downward, too. There's a scene in Bull Durham where career minor-leaguer Crash Davis takes note of the fact that, at 25 at-bats per week, the difference between 7 hits and 8 hits is the difference between Durham, North Carolina and Yankee Stadium. Everyone knows about Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa and Roger Clemens, but the list of players who've been penalized for performance enhancing drugs is filled with names most fans will barely recognize. They were desperate to hang on. 

What a relief just to be able to watch and enjoy a game. 

Defendant's dilemma

Maybe the justice system, including the deliberations of judges, doesn't work the way it gets talked about in media reports. If it does, then it seems that criminal defendants face a catch-22. First, they have to plead either guilty or not guilty. If they plead not guilty, and are later found guilty at trial, the judge determines their sentence, and one of the factors he's said to consider is their level of remorse. But, since the convicted person's official position is that he's not guilty, how can he reasonably be expected to exhibit remorse? He can only think he's been wrongly convicted, in which case he might be planning to appeal, which, again, is not compatible with the expectation that he show remorse. The "system," as described in a lot of journalistic commentary, demands bad faith.

Judge: How do you plead?

Defendant: Not guilty.

[Jury convicts.]

Judge: Would you like to say anything before I sentence you?

Defendant: Your Honor, I'm so sorry I did it. Really, really sorry. Please give me a light sentence. I'm full of remorse. 

It's journalistic speculations concerning the possibility that Judge Merchan will sentence Trump to prison that put this matter in my head. I suppose one way to resolve, somewhat, the contradiction might be to argue that a plea of "not guilty" doesn't mean "I didn't do it" but, rather, something more like "Bet you can't prove it." I say it resolves the difficulty only "somewhat" because, once you lose the bet, like Trump has, it still seems illogical to expect remorse, especially considering that an appeal might be forthcoming. The reaction to a verdict of "guilty" is less logically remorse than "No, you didn't actually prove it."  

Well, Trump is not the kind of criminal defendant I feel any sympathy for. "Bet you can't prove it" is what people who can hire teams of lawyers say. Also, the leading reason it's illogical to expect remorse from Trump is that he's a pathological narcissist. It's impossible for such people to feel remorse. Everyone else alive is just a game piece to be moved around their board. 

Dante never thought of it

If there were a hell, an ingenious punishment would be that you have to spend eternity watching your kid compete in athletics against a slightly superior opponent who always wins, barely, after a struggle. My daughter is now avenging my dad’s suffering and he didn’t even have it so bad, my losses occurring after briefer struggles in the more preliminary rounds.

Last days before summer vacation

Coming to the end of the school year. Last day is Thursday, and for this last week, instead of their uniforms, kids are encouraged to wear special clothes: today, for example, was cap day. My favorite was a little girl sporting a Twins cap atop her hijab. 

Fourth graders were assigned to make memes. Some of them are pretty good:

I thought I'd laughed at a fart joke for the last time, but the kid who did this one proved me wrong:

The "MCA"s are the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment, a standardized test measuring proficiency in math, science, and reading; you have to love people, of any age, who can laugh at themselves: