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A new measure of ‘Trump amnesia’ in swing states

Politics

April 30, 2024

A new measure of ‘Trump amnesia’ in swing states

In theory, elections are choices between two candidates whose positions are duly considered by voters and whose victories are a reflection of popular will for those positions. In reality, of course, things are hazier. Candidates emphasize or downplay their beliefs to win votes and are subject to the vagaries of public belief and memory in ways that can be hard to predict.

For example: On Sunday, CBS News published new polling from the three swing states that flipped to Donald Trump in 2016 and then flipped back to support Joe Biden four years later. The polling, conducted by YouGov, found that most respondents in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin viewed the economy in their states fairly poorly — a few percentage points better than the national economy but not great overall.

Predictably, there was a gap by party, with Democrats being substantially more likely to view the national and state economies positively.

But the pollsters also asked another question: How did respondents view the economy in their states under Trump? The split was striking: On average across the three states, respondents viewed their state’s economy at least 20 points more positively when Trump was president than viewed the economy positively now. That was driven heavily by overwhelmingly positive assessments from Republicans, but also by strongly positive retrospective views from independents.

Just before the 2020 election, YouGov asked voters in these same states how they viewed Trump’s handling of the economy — a different question than how people viewed the economy in their state, admittedly, but a useful means of comparing views of Trump before the 2020 election with how his tenure is viewed now.

In each state, respondents were 15 points less likely to have viewed Trump’s handling of the economy positively than said this month that their state economies were in good shape during the Trump presidency. The YouGov poll conducted in October 2020 aggregated party views across the three states, but the state-level results in the most recent poll were similar enough to show that the biggest differences between views of Trump in 2020 and retrospective views of the economy during his presidency came from Democrats.

On average, Democrats were 24 points more likely to tell YouGov this month that the economy under Trump was good than said they approved of Trump’s handling of the economy in October 2020.

It’s worth noting that between 5 and 7 percent fewer residents of these three states were employed in October 2020 than the previous October, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. In each of those three states, employment is at least 1 percent higher now than in October 2019.

It’s not uncommon, though, for polling to show that views of a president who has left office improve over time. In July, Gallup found that nine of the 10 presidents who preceded Biden had seen their approval ratings increase relative to when they were in office — including Trump. What’s unusual here is that a former president is running for election after having left office. The boost that Trump has seen since leaving office has ramifications that gains among other past presidents don’t.

The recent CBS News-YouGov poll also found that Democrats were much more likely to say that they were worried about having a functioning democracy in the future than they were about having a strong economy. Republicans were slightly more likely to say the opposite.

This is an unusual question to ask, one centered on the politics and political concerns of the moment. It is a reflection of the focus Biden has placed on the threat to democracy posed by Trump’s possible return to power. But it is also useful for Biden if Americans view economic issues as less urgent than preserving democracy — given that even members of his party view the economy under his opponent better than they did when his opponent was president.

Inside the Vatican’s Uncanny Venice Biennale Pavilion

World

Peter Watson

April 30, 2024

Inside the Vatican’s Uncanny Venice Biennale Pavilion

The outside of the Vatican Pavilion at the Venice Biennale featuring a mural by Maurizio Cattelan (photo Julie Baumgardner/Hyperallergic)

VENICE — There was a minute when the art press might have been able to meet the Pope. It was a short minute, a New York one, even — definitely not a Venetian one. The encounter was slated to take place at the Pavilion of the Holy See at the Venice Biennale on April 21; instead, Pope Francis became the first pontiff to visit the contemporary art event on Sunday, landing by helicopter in a private event with no outsiders allowed.

The Papacy is an organization that operates on secrecy. God, after all, isn’t exactly a visible figure. Faith requires a leap, a trust in the invisible. And yet visibility is at the heart of the Holy See Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, whose exhibition title, Con i miei occhi (With my eyes), is borrowed from Book of Job 42:5: “Mine eyes have seen thee.” But this isn’t exactly a pavilion about “being seen” in the sense of the English colloquialism denoting empathy and embrace, despite the Church’s attempts.

No, in fact, the literal infrastructure of the pavilion is hidden. In a prison. The Giudecca Women’s Detention Home is a 13th-century monastery converted into a prison for unwed mothers, sex workers, and mentally ill people in 1859. Curators Chiara Parisi and Bruno Racine selected nine artists to create site-specific works that engage and employ the imprisoned women. Visitors to Parisi and Racine’s exhibition cannot enter (nor exit) freely. It’s a pavilion quite literally hidden behind bars, where entry is only granted after a passport check, phones are sequestered, and doors only open after preceding ones are locked. A place where the rules aren’t in a citizen’s favor.

This pavilion, in particular, follows a strict protocol — and not just the one set by the Italian Ministry of Justice’s Department of Prison Administration. Visits are limited to groups of 25 people four times a day. They begin in the prison guard’s cafeteria, a space out of Italian central casting, where an espresso machine sits prominently on a bar alongside vitrines of cornettos, the walls covered in Corita Kent’s 1960s sloganeering serigraphs with mottos like “life-new life,” “yes people like us,” and “e eye love.” Kent was an activist American artist and nun, known as Sister Mary Corita Kent. She taught at the Immaculate Heart College in Los Angeles, where she set rules for the Art Department. One can take a pamphlet of them here: “Rule 1: Find a place you trust and then try trusting it for a while.” Against the backdrop of a prison, that’s a chilling order.

It’s here that the group meets the guides: Marceby and Giulia, who both participated in the art-making. Visitors are not allowed to ask the imprisoned women personal questions — where they come from, why they’re there, how long their sentence is.

Behind the commendatori — the chief warden, we’d call it in English — we follow. Led by Marceby, we walk down an outside corridor, where artist Simone Fattal has adapted letters prisoners mailed to their loved ones into paintings on volcanic slates that hang upon the walls. The commendatori explains that the imprisoned women only ever walk this corridor when arriving at and departing the prison.

Left: A representative from the Department of Prison Administration (left) along with Cardinal José Tolentino de Mendonça (second from the left) and Maurizio Cattelan (second from the right) (photo Julie Baumgardner/*Hyperallergic*); Right: The work of Simone Fattal at the Holy See Pavilion (photo by Marco Cremascoli, courtesy the Holy See Pavilion)

Fattal asked the women to write poems of their experience inside; these have been printed onto cardstock as take-away mementos for visitors. Marceby’s poem “Free Spirit” reads: “Corri cavallo bianco corri. Corri finché hai fiato.” (“Run white horse run. Run while you can still breathe.”)

Next, we are led into a grand courtyard, where an illuminated sign by Claire Fontaine faces the dormitories, reading “Siamo con voi nella notte” (“We are with you at night”). Indeed, the words, which were first graffitied in front of the federal jail in Florence as part of the 1970s Italian prison reform movement, shine brightly after dark. As Parisi put it, “the language used in all the works is present in the history of the place.”

Then comes Marco Perego’s untitled film starring Zoë Saldaña. Its claustrophobic depiction of squeezing through alleyways and tunnels is a haunting treatise on the power of female friendship through an intimate portrayal of the inmates. Tears are abundant in the viewing room — tears that only continue as we enter Claire Tabouret’s series depicting the women’s children, some of whom grew up within the prison’s walls, separated from their imprisoned mothers except for short encounters between 10am and 2pm on Wednesdays and Saturdays. It’s a reminder that children are unintended collateral in the carceral system.

The Giudecca Women’s Detention Home is notorious in Italy. One male, working-class Venetian resident who looked to be in his 40s told me, unprovoked, while we had morning espressos at a standing bar, of the Church hypocrisy in infantilizing pregnant women yet punishing those who use their sexuality to their advantage. “The pregnant women, they steal and get away with it, because the Vatican deems it ok,” he said. “But then they lock a woman away in Giudecca who sells her figa [read: slang for vagina]. How is this fair?” Inside the prison is a working farm, where those imprisoned produce a bounty of produce sold at market on Thursdays. Front and center in the setting is labor. They toil, whether in their everyday farming or for this pavilion. The official press line from the Detention Center about compensation is that it is “a confidential matter that will be defined internally.”

There’s been critique floating around about the exploitive capacity of the pavilion. But it’s complicated by the voices of the participants. “I’m not an artist, but this was an opportunity to be one,” Marceby said repeatedly during the tour. “I get to meet people every day, I get to write poetry, I get to connect to the outside world.” Can a project like this be an opportunity for empowerment, as suggested by Corita Kent’s adages, and a space for hope, as in Fattal’s or Fontaine’s projects, as much as one that unfairly takes advantage of those who provide labor without receiving the benefit?

The complication arises, as it often does, with the power exchange between players in these little acts of art. “The Church understands and accepts the autonomy of art,” the Cardinal told Hyperallergic. “I personally see a line of intersection between the mission of contemporary art and the mission of the Church.” Inviting Maurizio Cattelan, the Italian trickster who always shows up when least expected to pull prank — or rank, in this case, for Hyperallergic’s first of many promised interviews with the Cardinal was scratched in favor of the artist’s impromptu visit — might be read as a sign of this respect for art’s autonomy. Indeed, Cattelan’s “La Nona Ora” (1999), a statue of the pope struck by a meteor, caused cries of heresy throughout the land. But for an institution that preaches and protects itself behind vows of caritas and giving alms to the poor and unfortunate, the Vatican’s commandeering of imprisoned women reads more like a globally influential institution engaging in untransparent indentured labor to produce artwork for its own gain.

Throughout the exhibition, pleas of empowerment are tossed around frequently. Parisi calls these imprisoned artists “philosophers.” The Cardinal adds: “When we conceived the Pavilion, we imagined it as a listening station.” Works by Afro-Brazilian sculptor Sonia Gomes from her series Sinfonia (2021–present), consisting of 34 woven works of fabric, stones, and buttons hanging from the ceiling in the prison’s Baroque Chapel, is a gesture to “look up and be free,” as the artist told the inmates. It hangs between a fresco reading “Remissa sunt eius peccata multa” — “Her sins, though many, are forgiven.” There are still 80 women held at the prison as of press time.

Jerry Seinfeld’s Pop-Tarts Movie Unfrosted Promo Has Soup Nazi, More

Entertainment

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

Jerry Seinfeld’s Pop-Tarts Movie Unfrosted Promo Has Soup Nazi, More

Jerry Seinfeld and Tarty.

Pop-Tarts / Le Truc

Pop-Tarts is getting back at Jerry Seinfeld.

It all started when Seinfeld directed and co-wrote a movie, Unfrosted, about the origin of Pop-Tarts. He also stars in the film, which hits Netflix on May 3.

Unfrosted tells the (fictional) origin story of Pop-Tarts, which resulted in a race between breakfast rivals Kellogg’s and Post to create a pastry for the masses in 1963. While Pop-Tarts does indeed have an origin story, this is not it. (The idea had been percolating with Seinfeld for several years — he even made jokes about Pop-Tarts in his stand-up routine and once tweeted he was mulling over the idea of this film — but Pop-Tarts was not involved in the making of Unfrosted.)

“This really did happen in Battle Creek, Michigan, where Kellogg’s and Post were located, and they did compete to come up with this product,” Seinfeld has said. “But the rest of it is complete lunacy. … We’re going to tell you a story, but if we want to do something funny that doesn’t make any sense, we’re going to do that too.”

In a comedic digital short (written by Seinfeld) that was released Monday to promote Unfrosted, the actor-comedian meets with Kelman P. Gasworth, the (fictional) president of Pop-Tarts, in the company’s headquarters in Battle Creek, Mich., to discuss the film.

The issue? “When Jerry Seinfeld made the movie Unfrosted, he referenced 221 trademarked breakfast products without permission or proper legal clearance. This prompted a meeting,” explains a text card at the beginning.

“It’s my understanding that you neither sought nor received permission to use our product in your movie,” Gasworth tells Seinfeld.

Accompanied by the Pop-Tarts mascot, Tarty, Gasworth asks Seinfeld: “Are you familiar with the concept of trademark infringement? … You see Mr. Seinfeld, you took something of ours, and now, we’re going to take something of yours. Show him, Tarty.”

Tarty removes a blue covering from a large glass box that reveals three characters from Seinfeld.

“Schmoopie, Jackie Chiles and the Soup Nazi! My characters!” Seinfeld exclaims of the characters, memorably played by Ali Wentworth, Phil Morris and Larry Thomas, respectively.

Replies Gasworth: “They’re my characters now, Mr. Seinfeld. Tell me, how does it feel when people steal your ideas and then do whatever they want with them?

“You mean like Friends?” Seinfeld quips of another long-running, beloved comedy series.

Gasworth then says he’s created a new show, People in Pontiacs Eating Pop-Tarts, which is, of course, an imitation of Seinfeld’s Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.

Watch the digital short below.

For its part, Pop-Tarts isn’t actually upset. The company notes that the movie is “farce, not fact” but adds that it represents “the ultimate flattery because it is fanfiction.”

Moreover, Pop-Tarts has created a limited-edition Unfrosted Strawberry “Trat-Pops” packaging (typo intentional). Fans can sign up at poptarts.com/Unfrosted for a chance to win.

The limited-edition Unfrosted Strawberry “Trat-Pops” packaging

Pop-Tarts / Le Truc

Interactive mHealth App Helped Improve Patients’ Lifestyle Habits After Undergoing PCI

Lifestyle

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

Interactive mHealth App Helped Improve Patients’ Lifestyle Habits After Undergoing PCI

For patients with coronary heart disease who received a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), using the interactive mobile health (mHealth) application EVITE helped these patients improve and adhere to lifestyle changes.

Mobile health app | Image credit: Kaspars Grinvalds – stock.adobe.com

According to a study published in JMIR mHealth and uHealth, these lifestyle changes included adherence to the Mediterranean diet, improved frequency of healthy food consumption, increased physical activity, and quitting smoking.¹ The EVITE app also helped patients increase their knowledge of healthy lifestyles and the control of cardiovascular risk factors (CVRFs), and patients reported overall satisfaction with the app and improved quality of life. The app had multiple components—website, messages, emails, and calls—to encourage users to adhere to the lifestyle modifications, and associated taking medication with these daily activities to help establish set times for taking their medication.

“The self-monitoring and recording in the app improves the patients’ awareness of their lifestyle behavior, and motivation promotes the initiation and continuation of changes in behavior over time,” the authors said.

Coronary heart disease is a leading cause of death worldwide, and secondary prevention is essential to reduce the risk of further coronary events. As defined by Yale Medicine, a PCI is a non-surgical procedure that treats coronary artery blockages by opening up narrowed or blocked sections of the artery and restoring proper blood circulation to the heart.² Less invasive than a coronary artery bypass surgery, this procedure is usually conducted through a small artery in the wrist. Approximately 900,000 PCIs are performed annually in the US alone, with most patients discharged from the hospital within 24 hours and going back to their normal daily routines after a minimal recovery period.

In this randomized controlled trial, 128 participants were assigned to either the mHealth intervention group (n = 67) or the control group receiving standard health care (n = 61). Of this group, 71.9% were male and the mean (SD) age was 59.49 (8.97) years. The app facilitated goal-setting and self-monitoring of lifestyle habits and CVRFs, provided educational resources on healthy living, and offered motivational feedback on achievements and areas for improvement.

After 9 months, patients in the mHealth group demonstrated significant lifestyle improvements compared with the control group across several parameters. It is important to note that this study included patients who underwent PCI in Spain between November 2019 and June 2022, so precautions taken during the COVID-19 pandemic could potentially have impacted certain lifestyle changes during the study.

Mediterranean diet adherence was determined using the Mediterranean Adherence Score out of 14 points, with scores below 9 deemed low adherence and scores above 9 deemed high adherence. At baseline, adherence scores were similar between the mHealth (7.24) and control group (7.52). After 9 months, patients who used the mHealth app had a mean (SD) score of 11.83 (1.74) points, compared with a mean score of 10.14 (2.02) points in the control group (P < .001). Proportionally, more patients in the mHealth group adhered to the Mediterranean diet with a score above 9 points (90%) compared with the control group (75%; P = .02).

Using the food frequency questionnaire, the researchers found a significant reduction in the consumption of red meat and industrial pastries among those using the app compared with those in the control group. Meanwhile, patients using the app also significantly increased their vegetable, fruit, and whole-meal cereal consumption.

In another similar trend, the group using the EVITE app increased their physical activity significantly more than the control group, according to patient-reported entries. At baseline, the mHealth group was already slightly more active than the control group by about 35 minutes per week, but this difference increased drastically to nearly 150 minutes per week between the groups at 9 months; patients in the mHealth group increased their physical activity to a mean (SD) of 619.14 (318.21) min/week compared with 471.70 (261.43) min/week in the control group (P = .007).

At baseline, 33 mHealth patients and 26 control patients were active smokers. After 9 months, 25 patients who used the app quit smoking compared with 11 patients who did not use the app (P = .01).

A validated scale with 24 items and five response options was utilized to assess participants’ understanding of CVRFs and healthy lifestyle practices, with a maximum possible score of 120 points. A high level of knowledge was defined as correctly answering over 75% of the items or scoring at least 90 points on the scale. Participants in the mHealth group exhibited notably greater understanding of healthy lifestyle practices and cardiovascular risk factor management after using the app compared with those in the control group, with a mean (SD) score of 118.70 (2.65) points in the mHealth group compared with 111.25 (9.05) points in the control group (P < .001). However, therapeutic adherence showed similar improvements in both groups by the end of the follow-up period, with no statistically significant variances observed between them.

“Knowledge of the risk factors for the disease is an essential requirement for patients to decide to adopt behaviors in line with a healthy lifestyle,” the authors said. “However, people also need to be motivated to incorporate such behavior into their daily lives. Innovative mHealth technology could help to achieve both objectives by increasing the patients’ knowledge and motivation.”

In terms of quality of life, patients in the intervention group demonstrated significantly better scores in the physical component compared with the control group, while both groups showed similar scores for the mental component. Although the mHealth group showed slightly better scores in the well-being index, the difference did not reach statistical significance. Regarding overall satisfaction with health care, patients in the mHealth group rated their experience higher than those receiving standard health care, with mean (SD) scores of 48.22 (3.89) points and 46.00 (4.82) points, respectively, out of a maximum of 50 points (P = .002).

“More studies are required to examine the impact of smartphone interventions on people who have undergone a coronary event, with long-term follow-ups that analyze mortality and cardiac-cause hospitalization, because these are important yardsticks of the success of secondary prevention strategies that make it possible to establish the clinical importance of the findings,” the authors concluded. “Cost analyses are also required to promote the generalized use of these tools, their implementation, and their feasibility.”

References

Bernal-Jiménez MÁ, Calle G, Gutiérrez Barrios A, et al. Effectiveness of an interactive mhealth app (EVITE) in improving lifestyle after a coronary event: randomized controlled trial. JMIR Mhealth Uhealth. 2024;12:e48756. doi:10.2196/48756
Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Yale Medicine. Accessed April 24, 2024. https://www.yalemedicine.org/conditions/percutaneous-coronary-intervention-pci

Timberwolves’ Anthony Edwards can’t run from stardom anymore

Sport

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

Timberwolves’ Anthony Edwards can’t run from stardom anymore

PHOENIX — Fresh off, arguably, the most important performance of his young career, Anthony Edwards sat in front of the world with a white tank top and an all-black Atlanta Braves fitted cap that sat loose, hovering just above his crisp hairline — making him look more like an extra in Outkast’s “Player’s Ball” video than the future face of the NBA.

Edwards is who he is. Silly. Lovable. Intelligent. Country. He wears it all, loudly and proudly. He’s also a competitor. A trash-talker. He wears all of those things just as loud, just as proud.

You add all of that up and you have a star. You add all of those things up plus a 40-point performance in a playoff-sweeping 122-116 victory over the Phoenix Suns on Sunday night, and you start to enter superstardom.

Yet, Edwards, for one reason or another, is afraid to go there. For as honest, brash and confident as he is and can be, there lives a bashfulness inside the 22-year-old when it comes to talking about his stature within the sport’s most prestigious club.

A year ago, before a first-round loss to the eventual-champion Denver Nuggets, Edwards said he couldn’t consider himself a young star until he “wins in the playoffs.”

A year later, he did it. Edwards not only won in the playoffs, but he was the alpha in a series that featured the likes of Devin Booker and Kevin Durant, his all-time favorite player. Edwards led his organization to heights it hadn’t seen in 20 years, the second round of the NBA playoffs. He did it with rim-twisting dunks. He did it with a sweet shooting stroke. He did it with gnaw-your-arm-off defense. He did it with leadership. He did it with WWE “Suck It!” extracurriculars. He did it while giving an earful to the player he has looked up to since he was 5.

These are the things that make stars. This is what stardom looks like.

“Nah, not yet, man,” Edwards said Sunday after reaching the benchmark he placed on himself a year ago. “Not yet.”

Edwards, unbeknownst to him, lost the privilege to decide what he is and isn’t in this league.

Kevin Durant congratulates Anthony Edwards after Minnesota swept Phoenix in the first round of the NBA playoffs. (Christian Petersen / Getty Images)

When you score 40 points in a series-clinching victory — on the road at that — you’re a star. When you played 79 regular-season games and were the best player for a team that was one game short of having the top record in your conference, you’re a star. When you’re one of 12 players, at the age of 22, picked to represent your country in the Olympics, you’re a star. When you make everyone laugh every time you’re in front of a microphone, order McDonald’s off Uber Eats immediately after a game, like he did in Detroit last season, you’re a star.

“He’s the face of the league,” said teammate Karl-Anthony Towns, who sat next to Edwards as his reserved side took center stage when talking about his status in the NBA. “He hates when I say it, but it’s true. Like I said, ‘Future so bright, got to put the sunglasses on.’ ”

Regular players don’t decide to dominate when they have a chance to end their opponent for good. They don’t have that ability. Stars shoot 11 of 15 from the floor for 31 points in the second half when their team is trailing at halftime like Edwards did on Sunday. Stars muster up their last bit of energy late in the fourth quarter to throw down a “Night, night!” dunk — like he did with just over two minutes to play when he crossed up Bradley Beal on the wing, took a gather dribble, launched from outside of the paint and forced his childhood hero out of the way as he punished the rim like it hit his sister.

Stars get on their other star teammate amid all the chaos when they do something wrong like Edwards did when Towns committed another unnecessary foul with the game in the balance.

Edwards can’t run from it anymore. No matter how hard he tries. If he doesn’t want to be a star, then stop playing like one.

“He rises to the occasion,” Wolves forward Kyle Anderson told The Athletic.

Stars also make their teammates better. That’s the point of having a star. The gravity of one person makes the existence of others more meaningful.

Edwards picked apart the Suns’ defense as a playmaker. The 40 points will make the headlines, but he also had six assists with only two turnovers in 41 minutes of play. He should have had 10-plus assists, but the Wolves couldn’t buy a bucket in the game’s first 24 minutes.

There were signs throughout the season, but it was this series where Edwards blossomed as a creator for others. There were times early on in his career when it felt like he passed because he had to. There was nowhere else for him to go.

As the season went on, and this playoff series played out, Edwards was welcoming blitzes so that he could create advantages to make the pass to an open man, so that he could get his teammates involved in the flow of the game, so that this Timberwolves team could potentially do something only one team before has accomplished in the franchise’s 35-year history.

But, yeah, Edwards is not a star.

“He is a good person,” said Minnesota assistant coach Micah Nori, who filled in for coach Chris Finch after a collision on the sideline in the fourth quarter left him with a serious leg injury. “And what I mean by that is, they trust him. He’s got some self-humor. You’ve seen all of his interviews. He’s the first one to congratulate and move all of his glory over to his teammates. They all love him.

“When he plays, makes the right play, and they know he cares, not only about himself but the team, he’s done a good job of stepping up in that regard.”

Edwards can keep running from the label all he wants, but if he doesn’t want to embrace it out of fear of being content, then it will never go away. His mindset is correct. His intentions are good. But it’s impossible for anyone with two eyes and a pinch of sense not to see a star when they look at Edwards.

From this point on, there’s no point in even asking Edwards about it. He has spoken — with his play and his personality. He never needs to say it out loud. We’ll all keep saying it for him.

“He’s my favorite player to watch,” Durant said of his star pupil after Sunday’s game. “He’s just grown so much since coming in the league. At 22, his love for the game shines so bright. That’s one of the reasons why I like him the most because he just loves basketball and is grateful to be in this position.

“He’s going to be someone I follow for the rest of his career.”

The Naked-Eye Sky Will (Briefly) Host a New Star

Science

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

The Naked-Eye Sky Will (Briefly) Host a New Star

RockDoctor (Slashdot reader #15,477) wants to tell you about a “new” star that will be visible to the naked eye — without a telescope — sometime before September:
By “star”, I do not mean “comet”, “meteorite” or “firefly”, but genuine [star] photons arriving here after about 3000 years in flight, causing your eyes to see a bright point on the nighttime sky. When it happens, the star will go from needing-a- telescope-or-good-binoculars-to-see, to being the 50th (or even 30th) brightest star in the sky.

For a week or so. Of course, it could just go full-on supernova, and be visible in daylight for a few weeks, and dominate the night sky for months. But that’s unlikely.
Named “T Corona Borealis” (because it’s the 20th variable star studied in the constellation “Corona Borealis”) it’s now visible all night, all year, for about 60% of the world’s population (although normally you need binoculars to see it).

But RockDoctor writes that in 2016, “T CrB” (as it is known) has started showing “a similar pattern of changes” to what happened in the late 1930s when it became one of only 10 “recurring nova” known to science:

In 2023, the pattern continued and the match of details got better. The star is expected to undergo another “eruption” — becoming one of the brightest few stars in the sky, within the next couple of months. Maybe the next couple of weeks. Maybe the next couple of hours….

Last week, astrophysicist Dr Becky Smethurst posted on the expected event in her monthly “Night Sky News” video blog. If you prefer your information in text not video, the AAVSO (variable star observers) posted a news alert for it’s observers a while ago. They also hosted a seminar on the star, and why it’s eruption is expected Real Soon Now, which is also on YouTube. A small selection of recent papers on the subject are posted here, which also includes information on how to get the most up-to-date brightness readings (unless you’re a HST / JWST / Palomar / Hawai`i / Chile telescope operator). Yes, the “big guns” of astronomy have prepared their “TOO — Target Of Opportunity” plans, and will be dropping normal observations really quickly when the news breaks and slewing TOO the target.

You won’t need your eclipse glasses for this. (Dr Becky’s video covers where you can send them for re-use.) But you might want to photograph the appropriate part of the sky so you’ll notice when the bomb goes off. Bomb? Did I say that the best model for what is happening is a thermonuclear explosion like a H-bomb the size of the Earth detonating? Well, that’s the best analogue.
This CNN article includes a nice animation from NASA illustrating the multi-star interaction that’s causing the event:

The stars in the orbiting pair are close enough to each other that they interact violently. The red giant becomes increasingly unstable over time as it heats up, casting off its outer layers that land as matter on the white dwarf star. The exchange of matter causes the atmosphere of the white dwarf to gradually heat until it experiences a “runaway thermonuclear reaction,” resulting in a nova [according to NASA]…

The NASAUniverse account on X, formerly known as Twitter, will provide updates about the outburst and its appearance.

The BBC reiterates the key data points — that “The rare cosmic event is expected to take place sometime before September 2024. When it occurs it will likely be visible to the naked eye. No expensive telescope will be needed to witness this cosmic performance, says NASA.”

Trump, GOP seize on campus Gaza protests to attack Biden

Politics

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

Trump, GOP seize on campus Gaza protests to attack Biden

Former president Donald Trump and other prominent Republicans are seizing on the eruption of campus protests across the country to depict the United States as out of control under President Biden, seeking to use the mostly peaceful demonstrations as a political cudgel against the Democrats.

The pro-Palestinian protests at numerous colleges — including Columbia, Yale, Emory, the University of Southern California, the University of Texas at Austin and others — include encampments and barricades intended to highlight protesters’ denunciation of Israel’s military onslaught in Gaza, as well as to push universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel.

Beyond the disruption to campus life, top Republicans have highlighted the antisemitic chants that have occurred at some of the protests. The issue is complicated by a debate over what constitutes antisemitism — and when criticism of Israel crosses that line — while some student organizers have denounced the chants or said they are coming from outside activists.

Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has cited the protests to accuse Biden and Democrats of being unable to maintain order or quash lawlessness, an accusation he has leveled at the president on other hot-button political issues. He has also highlighted the protests as a way to air his own political grievances, including the lack of similar demonstrations around his current criminal trial.

On Monday morning, Trump posted on Truth Social, “STOP THE PROTESTS NOW!!!”

As the protests have mushroomed in recent days, numerous Republicans have sought ways to highlight them as an example of the country’s slide into chaos. Several Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), have visited the campus of Columbia University, the site of some of the most sweeping protests, to call for its president to resign for purportedly failing to contain the demonstrations.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, dispatched more than 100 state troopers to the University of Texas at Austin to clear out pro-Palestinian protesters, resulting in dozens of arrests. All of the charges against the protesters were later dropped for lack of probable cause.

The campus protests present conservatives with some of their favorite targets: elite universities, progressive activists, “woke” culture and civil rights leaders. In addition, attacking the protests allows Republicans to change the subject from less friendly political terrain, such as abortion rights and the war in Ukraine.

Their rhetoric is harsh in many cases. Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) have demanded that Biden mobilize the National Guard to protect Jewish Americans on campus. Hawley compared the standoff to the battle over segregation in 1957, when President Dwight D. Eisenhower summoned the National Guard to force the integration of Central High School in Little Rock.

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) suggested that the college protesters were mentally unstable. “You don’t get to turn our public places into a garbage dump. No civilization should tolerate these encampments. Get rid of them,” Vance posted on X. “If you want to protest peacefully fine. It’s your right. But go home and take a shower at the end of the day. These encampments are just gross. Wanting to participate in this is a mental illness.”

The GOP rhetoric has not been limited to campus protests, sometimes covering pro-Palestinian actions more broadly, including those that have shut down roads and bridges in some cities. Cotton, in a post on X, urged those who get stuck behind “pro-Hamas mobs blocking traffic” to “take matters into your own hands.” Following criticism that some might read that as a call to violence, Cotton amended his post to say “take matters into your own hands to get them out of the way.”

Supporters of the campus protests say they are peaceful, and that accusations of antisemitism are often a pretext to shut down dissenting voices. Many of the Republicans criticizing the protests, they say, condoned or excused the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, which was far more violent.

The students are “peacefully protesting for an end of the Israeli genocide against Palestinians in Gaza,” the group Jewish Voices for Peace, which supports a cease-fire in Gaza, said of the Columbia protests. “ … We condemn any and all hateful or violent comments targeting Jewish students; however, in shutting down public protest and suspending students, the actions of the University of Columbia are not ensuring safety for Jewish students — or any students — on campus.”

The Israel-Gaza war has deeply fractured the Democratic Party, posing significant political challenges to Biden months ahead of November’s presidential contest. Biden pledged steadfast support of Israel after Hamas militants stormed through the Israel-Gaza border on Oct. 7 and killed 1,200 people, many of them civilians, and took 253 hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

Israel responded with a punishing military campaign in Gaza that has killed more than 34,000 Palestinians, imposing a siege that has created a humanitarian catastrophe as Gaza’s health system has collapsed and the population faces a looming famine. The resulting protest movement has electrified many younger voters and progressives, as well as others in the Democratic coalition that Biden needs to repeat his 2020 win, who have called for the United States to impose conditions for aid to Israel or suspend it altogether.

Democrats have voiced a range of views on the legitimacy of the protests, and Biden has sought a balance between condemning antisemitism and supporting students’ right to protest. Republicans, in contrast, are largely unified in casting the demonstrations as a disgrace, echoing conservative denunciations of the anti-Vietnam War protests of the 1960s.

Trump this week called a 2017 neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville — which he said at the time had “very fine people on both sides,” prompting a bipartisan backlash — a “peanut” compared with the current protests on campuses. Speaking to reporters after attending his criminal trial in New York on Thursday, Trump repeated the comments he wrote on social media and went further. He called the Charlottesville gathering, where a counterprotester was killed, “a little peanut” and added, “it was nothing compared — the hate wasn’t the kind of hate that you have here.”

Trump has contrasted the pro-Palestinian demonstrations with the lack of protests outside the Manhattan courthouse where he is on trial for an alleged hush money scheme. In seeking to blame Biden for the campus protests, Trump has accused the president of hating Israel, Jews and Palestinians, and accused Jewish Democrats of hating their religion. Many of the protesters are Jewish students, and progressive Jewish organizations have helped lead a number of protest movements since the war began in October.

“The Courthouse area in Lower Manhattan is in a COMPLETE LOCKDOWN mode, not for reasons of safety, but because they don’t want any of the thousands of MAGA supporters to be present,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday. “If they did the same thing at Columbia, and other locations, there would be no problem with the protesters!”

The tone of the criticism is not new; since Biden took office, Trump and other Republicans have pushed the notion that America is descending into chaos and lawlessness on his watch. From illegal immigration to soaring inflation to violent crime, they have regularly painted a picture of a country out of control.

These assertions have often been exaggerated or without context, but Trump has seized on them to promise a fierce crackdown should he return to power.

And during his 2020 reelection campaign, Trump tweeted in response to the large-scale protests over the police killing of George Floyd, which were mostly peaceful but occasionally turned to looting, writing, “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.” The post was widely criticized for potentially encouraging private citizens, or police officers, to take deadly aim at looters.

Trump’s own position on Israel has often been hard to pin down. He has tried to position himself as a firm defender of Israel, but he has also criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s handling of the war and sought to exploit the fissures in Biden’s coalition over U.S. support of Israel.

After the Oct. 7 attack, Trump insulted Israel’s leaders while praising the intelligence of the Hezbollah militant group. Faced with a backlash to that comment, the former president proposed harsh policies against Muslim migrants, saying he would reimpose his ban on travel from Muslim-majority countries and deport students involved in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

In the weeks after the Hamas massacre, Trump said his administration would revoke student visas of “radical, anti-American and antisemitic foreigners.” Other Republicans still running for president at the time — including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.) — and GOP members of Congress similarly called for the visas of “pro-Hamas” foreign students to be revoked.

The spread of the college protests has ignited a renewed Republican response. When word circulated last Wednesday that pro-Palestinian protesters were planning to occupy a lawn at the University of Texas, Gov. Abbott sought to show that his Republican-dominated state would not tolerate a repeat of the encampment at Columbia University, dispatching state troopers.

The Texas Department of Public Safety said it responded to the campus “at the direction of” Abbott, who applauded the crackdown on social media. He said the protesters “belong in jail” and that any student participating in “hate-filled, antisemitic protests” at public colleges should be expelled.

Incidents at some universities have fed the criticisms, though pro-Palestinian activists say they are isolated incidents. Video re-emerged this week of a Columbia student who has taken part in the pro-Palestinian protest encampments declaring that “Zionists don’t deserve to live.” The student, Khymani James, made the comments in a video posted in January, although he has since stated that they were wrong. Columbia said it had barred the student from campus, but it was unclear whether he was suspended or expelled.

In Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp (R), following protests in several cities including Chicago and San Francisco, stressed that he would not tolerate anything similar in his state. Recounting a conversation with Georgia’s public safety commissioner, he said: “You know how I feel about people blocking bridges, airports and other things like we’re seeing around the country. I said, ‘If they do that, lock their ass up.’ ”

In New York City, Speaker Johnson and a group of GOP lawmakers visited Columbia’s campus on Wednesday, where they demanded that the university’s president, Nemat “Minouche” Shafik, resign for failing to quickly dismantle the pro-Palestine encampments and, in their view, for not doing enough to ensure that Jewish people on campus felt safe.

Their visit appeared to raise tensions, as Johnson was met with boos and pro-Palestinian chants. One student yelled at Johnson to “get off our campus,” while another shouted, “go back to Louisiana, Mike!”

And on Capitol Hill, Republicans last week urged the Biden administration to intervene in the demonstrations. Rep. Elise Stefanik (N.Y.), a top-ranking House Republican, sent a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas and Attorney General Merrick Garland, calling on them to deport students who she said “are brazenly endorsing Hamas and other terrorist organizations” by participating in demonstrations and related events on campus.

Separately, a group of 27 Senate Republicans, including every member of the Senate GOP leadership team, signed onto a letter to Cardona and Garland calling on the administration “to take action to restore order and protect Jewish students on our college campuses.”

“The Department of Education and federal law enforcement must act immediately to restore order, prosecute the mobs who have perpetuated violence and threats against Jewish students, revoke the visas of all foreign nationals (such as exchange students) who have taken part in promoting terrorism, and hold accountable school administrators who have stood by instead of protecting their students,” the letter said.

Isaac Arnsdorf contributed to this report.

Shari Redstone playing M&A war games with Paramount CEO removal

Business

Peter Watson

April 29, 2024

Shari Redstone playing M&A war games with Paramount CEO removal

Bob Bakish, CEO of Paramount, speaks with CNBC’s David Faber on Sept. 6, 2023.

CNBC

The decision to remove Bakish as CEO comes as Paramount Global closes in on a merger agreement with Skydance Media. His departure could help force through a deal.

A number of large common shareholders, including Gamco Investors, Ariel Investments, Matrix and Aspen Sky Trust have publicly criticized the deal, arguing it destroys value for common shareholders. The Skydance offer would include billions of new equity that would dilute common holders.

Shari Redstone, president of National Amusements and controlling shareholder of Paramount Global, walks to a morning session at the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, July 12, 2023.

David A. Grogan | CNBC

Meanwhile, Skydance would pay about $2 billion to controlling shareholder Shari Redstone for her 77% voting shares in the company by acquiring her holding company National Amusements, CNBC has previously reported, marking a significant premium for Redstone, whose economic interest in the company has fallen to less than $1 billion.

The imbalance has led many at Paramount, including Bakish, to speak out against the deal, which they see as only benefitting Redstone.

“There’s no question I’d rather see no sale,” Gamco chairman and CEO Mario Gabelli told The New York Post earlier this month.

That’s where Monday’s CEO drama begins.

Redstone is now open to a so-called “majority of the minority” vote on the Skydance deal, according to a person familiar with her thinking. Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal first reported the development on Sunday.

That’s a significant turn in the Skydance talks. It means minority shareholders will now have a say in whether the deal proceeds, giving the deal’s denouncers potential sway in the outcome. Paramount Global shares jumped about 5% in premarket trading Monday.

Typically, Paramount Global shareholders, such as Gabelli, would compare an offer to the standalone company’s prospects — hence his comments about not seeing a sale at all.

But by removing Bakish, Redstone and the Paramount Global board are now throwing the status quo into chaos. The company will no longer have a leader or a clear go-forward strategy. Redstone may be trying to force common holders to choose a sale by effectively destabilizing the company without one.

Exclusivity talks with Skydance are set to end May 3. CNBC reported last week Skydance was inching toward valuation terms but wanted a two-week extension on exclusivity, which the special committee hadn’t yet granted.

“National Amusements specifically requested that the Paramount board form a special committee to exercise their dependent judgment in considering a potential transaction with Skydance,” a National Amusements spokesperson said in a statement provided to CNBC. “National Amusements has no role on the committee, and we respect the committee’s process and ultimate decision on whether the Skydance deal presents an attractive transaction for Paramount and whether they want to continue to move forward.”

With a majority of the minority vote in place, Skydance plans to sweeten its offer to make it more appealing to common holders, Bloomberg reported. It’s unclear if the company will be able to alter terms drastically enough to convince common investors to change their minds.

A joint bid by private equity firm Apollo Global and Sony could serve as a white knight if investors don’t want Skydance and don’t have a viable non-sale option. The New York Times reported earlier this month the two parties have had preliminary talks on a deal.

Shareholders will wait to see if the parties present a formal offer with details about who is funding an acquisition. Regulators could view an acquisition by Apollo and Sony as more of a risk if funding is provided by foreign entities. Sony, too, is a non-U.S.-based company, which could theoretically trigger concerns related to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which would likely review the delay.

Meanwhile, Paramount has an important carriage renewal deal with U.S. cable company Charter Communications in the coming days. Bakish has been deep in negotiations with Charter. It’s unclear how his removal will affect those negotiations, which will play a large role in valuing the company moving forward.

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