Streetscape
King’s Cross, London
Quote of the Day
”Never fire a warning shot. It is a waste of ammunition.”
- Hunter S. Thompson
Musical alternative to the morning’s radio news
Dick Gaughan | Now Westlin’ Winds
A mesmeric rendition of Robert Burns’s lovely poem in the Crane Bar in Galway.
Now westlin’ winds and slaught’ring guns Bring Autumn’s pleasant weather; The moorcock springs on whirring wings Amang the blooming heather: Now waving grain, wide o’er the plain, Delights the weary farmer; And the moon shines bright, as I rove by night, To muse upon my charmer…
Long Read of the Day
Harvard vs Trump vs the Media: An Update.
James Fallows’s scathing assessment of the New York Times’s coverage of Trump’s feud with America’s oldest university.
I am writing today about America’s oldest, richest, and best-known educational institution—Harvard—and the way it is handling the responsibilities that come with its power and prominence.
I’m also writing about one of the oldest, best-known, and most influential news organizations in the country—the New York Times—and the way it is covering Harvard’s response to these unprecedented MAGA attacks.
What Harvard ultimately does—defy, comply, work out something quietly—obviously matters more than mere news stories about that choice. Harvard’s actions and example matter not just because of Harvard’s scale but also because they will have ramifications for thousands of other American institutions that are deciding, right now, how much they dare stand up to Trump demands.
But the coverage itself matters too…
Great piece.
So many books, so little time
I read this years ago, and really admired it. But then memory of it faded into the background, as memories do. And then, the other day, I rediscovered it. At the height of his fame, Steinbeck decided that he would like to see what his country was (or had become). So he went on a road trip across the continental United States. But because he was so well known, he decided that he couldn’t stay in hotels — he aspired to be an unknown observer. So he persuaded an auto-manufacturer to build him what may well have been the first camper-van (or RV as the genre became known in the US). And he embarked on what must be the most beautifully recounted road trip ever, with his poodle Charley for company, in the process creating an utterly entrancing book.
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