DL Open Thread: Saturday, September 2, 2023
Jimmy Buffett Dies–Price Of Cheeseburgers To Plummet? The Poet Laureate of lassitude who turned branding into an art form. The linked profile from 2018 captures the conundrum/contradictions therein:
Because that, in a coconut shell, was the problem. Jimmy Buffett is not really Jimmy Buffett anymore. He hasn’t been for a while. Jimmy Buffett — the nibbling on sponge cake, watching the sun bake, getting drunk and screwing, it’s 5 o’clock somewhere Jimmy Buffett — has been replaced with a well-preserved businessman who is leveraging the Jimmy Buffett of yore in order to keep the Jimmy Buffett of now in the manner to which the old Jimmy Buffett never dreamed he could become accustomed. And therein lies the Margaritaville® Mesquite BBQ Rub: The more successful you become at selling the Jimmy Buffett lifestyle, the less you are seen as believably living the Jimmy Buffett lifestyle.
Who is to say when the chasm between the Jimmy Buffetts became so deep? Probably it was around the first time he put the Margaritaville name on a salt shaker-shaped pool raft labeled “Lost Shaker of Salt.” Or went all-in on a brand partnership to sell a $499.99 Tahiti™ Frozen Concoction Maker®. Or when he signed off on the emblazonment of “I’m the Woman to Blame” across a Tervis tumbler. Sometime around then, Jimmy Buffett entered a point of no return where the lifestyle of the erstwhile Jimmy Buffett became so distant and unrecognizable to the new Jimmy Buffett that he understood there could be a problem in the making. “The glue that holds this thing together is authenticity,” he told me on the 35th floor of the Mandarin Oriental hotel, where he eats breakfast when he’s in New York. “People can smell it if it isn’t real.”
I came. I smelled. I shrugged.
OK, RIP. I still say the lyric should have read, “Wasting away again in Mediocreville”.
WV Gov. Jim “There’s No” Justice Seeks To Reopen Toxic Coal Plant–In Alabama:
The ultrawealthy family of West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice is looking to reopen a shuttered industrial plant that for decades emitted chemicals that have harmed historically Black neighborhoods in Birmingham, Alabama. But the family faces a series of new regulatory and financial hurdles — including a push by local regulators to throw the governor’s son in jail over thousands of dollars in unpaid penalties connected to the plant’s pollution.
The century-old facility, which burns coal to make coke, a key ingredient for manufacturing steel, was the subject of a 2022 ProPublica investigation that showed how the family’s company and the plant’s past owners repeatedly failed to make necessary repairs. Without timely maintenance, Bluestone Coke released more cancer-causing chemicals into the air breathed by residents of three surrounding communities on Birmingham’s north side. In 2021, local regulators declined to renew Bluestone’s permit because of its repeated violations of air pollution regulations, but the plant kept operating as Bluestone appealed the decision. Months later, the company idled its coke ovens because of major equipment problems.
Rudy Giuliani: Russian Operative?:
But another major Giuliani development has drawn less attention: An FBI whistleblower filed a statement asserting that Giuliani “may have been compromised” by Russian intelligence while working as a lawyer and adviser to Trump during the 2020 campaign.
That contention is among a host of explosive assertions from Johnathan Buma, an FBI agent who also says that an investigation involving Giuliani’s activities was stymied within the bureau.
In July, Buma sent the Senate Judiciary Committee a 22-page statement full of eye-popping allegations, and the document leaked and was first reported last month by Insider (after a conservative blogger had posted it online). According to Buma’s account, Giuliani was used as an asset by a Ukrainian oligarch tied to Russian intelligence and other Russian operatives for a disinformation operation that aimed to discredit Joe Biden and boost Trump in the 2020 presidential race. Moreover, Buma says he was the target of retaliation within the bureau for digging into this.
Buma’s revelations may only be the start. A source familiar with his work tells Mother Jones that other potential FBI whistleblowers who participated in the investigation involving Giuliani have consulted the same lawyer as Buma and might meet with congressional investigators in coming weeks.
Which reminds me: Who would ever attend a $100,000 per plate dinner to raise funds for this guy? Besides, I mean, Russians?
Defunding = Book-Burning: Right-wing Nazis on verge of succeeding in shutting down public library in Virginia:
A public county library in Virginia is at risk of shutting down after a group of far-right community members launched a campaign to defund it on accusations it held “pornographic books” though in fact the works usually just explore LGBTQ+ themes.
Samuels Library in Front Royal’s Warren County is set to close on 1 October as public funding has been withheld by the Warren county board of supervisors since July, cutting off crucial financial support.
America has been hit by a wave of rightwing protests at libraries and schools that usually target books and material that have LGBTQ+ characters, plots or stories. The move is part of a wider rightwing cultural backlash, especially in Republican-led US states.
Which reminds me–The Arden Library is holding a Banned Books Month in October. We’re on the verge of putting together perhaps the coolest Banned Books Month event EVER in late October. More details as we nail ’em down.
Which also reminds me–got an early morning shift at the Arden Fair book sale today, followed by two hours as a beer narc in the Shady Grove. Come say ‘hi’!
What do you want to talk about?
There are no cheeseburgers in paradise because there is no heaven. I always kinda hated Jimmy Buffett.
Well, at least you’re not shutting down public libraries in VA.
You must be fun at parties.
I never get invited to any. 🙁
Ron DeSantis’ goon squad roughed up a New Hampshire 15-year-old whose question about Trump stumped the chump.
That prompted someone at LGM to observe, “DeSantis really does appear to be running Montgomery Burns’ campaign, only with even less ability to interact with actual living humans.”
The author of that NYT Buffett profile, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, tweeted, “May he rest in peace in a soft breeze and endlessly swinging hammock in the sky, where it is always 5 pm.”
Prose as breathless as the late Mr. Buffett is today.
I may have seen you at the book sale. The fair was packed as soon as it opened. Great job as usual.
I was wearing the black Arden Fair Crew shirt. Also a mask since I got a mild case of Covid last year right after the Fair. Make sure you say hi next time!