Democracy Now! | August 30, 2022 We discuss Western hegemony and U.S. policy in Russia, Ukraine and China with Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, whose new article is headlined “The West’s False Narrative About Russia and China.” Sachs says the bipartisan U.S. approach to foreign policy is “unaccountably dangerous and wrongheaded,” and warns the U.S. is creating “a recipe for yet another war” in East Asia. Transcript This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form. AMY GOODMAN: Politico is reporting the Biden administration is preparing to ask Congress to approve a new $1.1 billion arms sale to Taiwan. The package reportedly includes 60 anti-ship missiles, 100 air-to-air missiles. This comes after two U.S. warships sailed through the Taiwan Strait Sunday for the first time since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan earlier this month. China condemned the visit and launched major military drills near Taiwan. Meanwhile, President Biden announced $3 billion in more military aid for Ukraine last week, including money for missiles, artillery rounds and drones to help Ukrainian forces fight Russia. We begin today’s show looking at U.S. policy on Russia and China. We’re joined by the economist Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University. He’s president of the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He served as adviser to three U.N. secretaries-general. His latest article is headlined “The West’s False Narrative About Russia and China.” He begins the article by writing, quote, “The world is on the edge of nuclear catastrophe in no small part because of the failure of Western political leaders to be forthright about the causes of the escalating global conflicts. The relentless Western narrative that the West is noble while Russia and China are evil is simple-minded and extraordinarily dangerous,” Jeffrey Sachs writes. Jeffrey Sachs, welcome to Democracy Now! Why don’t you take it from there? JEFFREY SACHS: Thank you. Good to be with you. AMY GOODMAN: What is the story that people in the West and around the world should understand about what’s happening right now with these conflicts, with Russia, with Russia and Ukraine, and with China? JEFFREY SACHS: The main point, Amy, is that we are not using diplomacy; we are using weaponry. This sale now announced to Taiwan that you’ve been discussing this morning is just another case in point. This does not make Taiwan safer. This does not make the world safer. It certainly doesn’t make the United States safer. This goes back a long way. I think it’s useful to start 30 years ago. The Soviet Union ended, and some American leaders got it into their head that there was now what they called the unipolar world, that the U.S. was the sole superpower, and we could run the show. The results have been disastrous. We have had now three decades of militarization of American foreign policy. A new database that Tufts is maintaining has just shown that there have been more than 100 military interventions by the United States since 1991. It’s really unbelievable. And I have seen, in my own experience over the last 30 years working extensively in Russia, in Central Europe, in China and in other parts of the world, how the U.S. approach is a military-first, and often a military-only, approach. We arm who we want. We call for NATO enlargement, no matter what other countries say may be harmful to their security interests. We brush aside anyone else’s security interests. And when they complain, we ship more armaments to our allies in that region. We go to war when we want, where we want, whether it was Afghanistan or Iraq or the covert war against Assad in Syria, which is even today not properly understood by the American people, or the war in Libya. And we say, “We’re peace-loving. What’s wrong with Russia and China? They are so warlike. They’re out to undermine the world.” And we end up in terrible confrontations. The war in Ukraine — just to finish the introductory view — could have been avoided and should have been avoided through diplomacy. What President Putin of Russia was saying for years was “Do not expand NATO into the Black Sea, not to Ukraine, much less to Georgia,” which if people look on the map, straight across to the eastern edge of the Black Sea. Russia said, “This will surround us. This will jeopardize our security. Let us have diplomacy.” The United States rejected all diplomacy. I tried to contact the White House at the end of 2021 — in fact, I did contact the White House and said there will be war unless the U.S. enters diplomatic talks with President Putin over this question of NATO enlargement. I was told the U.S. will never do that. That is off the table. And it was off the table. Now we have a war that’s extraordinarily dangerous. And we are taking exactly the same tactics in East Asia that led to the war in Ukraine. We’re organizing alliances, building up weaponry, trash-talking China, having Speaker Pelosi fly to Taiwan, when the Chinese government said, “Please, lower the temperature, lower the tensions.” We say, “No, we do what we want,” and now send more arms. This is a recipe for yet another war. And to my mind, it’s terrifying. We are at the 60th anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis, which I’ve studied all my life and I’ve written about, have written a book about the aftermath. We are driving to the precipice, and we are filled with our enthusiasm as we do so. And it’s just unaccountably dangerous and wrongheaded, the whole approach of U.S. foreign policy. And it’s bipartisan. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Jeffrey Sachs, I wanted to ask you — one of the things that you mentioned in a recent article that was published in Consortium News was this insistence of the United States, dragging Europe along, as well, in maintaining hegemony throughout the world at a time when the economic power of the West is declining. You mention, for instance, that the BRICS nations — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — represent more than 40% of the world population and have a greater GDP than the G7 nations, yet their interests and their concerns are pretty much dismissed or, in the case, obviously, of Russia and China, portrayed to the American people as the aggressors, as the authoritarians, as the ones that are creating turmoil in the world. JEFFREY SACHS: Your point is — JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I’m wondering if you could expand on that. JEFFREY SACHS: Yeah, absolutely, and directing us to that is extremely important. The disproportionate power of the Western world, and especially the Anglo-Saxon world, which started with the British Empire, and now the United States, is about 250 years old, so a short period in world history. It happened, for a lot of very interesting reasons, that the Industrial Revolution came to England first. The steam engine was invented there. That’s probably the single most important invention of modern history. Britain became militarily dominant in the 19th century, like the United States was in the second half of the 20th century. Britain ran the show. Britain had the empire on which the sun never set. And the West, meaning the United States and Western Europe, now meaning the U.S. and the European Union, the U.K., Canada, Japan — in other words, the G7, the European Union together — is a small part of the world population, perhaps now roughly 10%, a little bit more, maybe 12.5% if you add in Japan to Western Europe and the U.S. But the mindset is “We run the world.” And that was the way it was for 200 years in this Industrial Age. But times have changed. And really, since the 1950s, the rest of the world, when it gained independence from European imperialism, started to educate its populations, started to adopt and adapt and innovate technologies. And lo and behold, a small sliver of the world really didn’t run the world or didn’t have a monopoly on wisdom or knowledge or science or technology. And this is wonderful. The knowledge and possibility of decent lives is spreading throughout the whole world. But in the United States, there is a resentment to this, a deep resentment. I think there’s also a tremendous historical ignorance, because I think a lot of U.S. leaders have no clue as to modern history. But they resent China’s rise. That is an affront to the United States. How dare China rise! This is our world! This is our century! And so, starting around 2014, I saw, step by step — I watched it with intense detail, because it’s my daily activity — how the United States recast China not as a country that was recovering from a century and a half of great difficulty, but rather as an enemy. And we consciously, as a matter of American foreign policy, started to say, “We need to contain China. China’s rise is no longer in our interest,” as if the United States is to determine whether China is prosperous or not. The Chinese are not naive; in fact, they’re extraordinarily sophisticated. They watched all of this exactly the same way that I did. I know the authors of the U.S. texts. They are my colleagues, at Harvard or other places. I was shocked when this kind of containment idea started to be applied. But the basic point is, the West has led the world for a brief period, 250 years, but feel, “That’s our right. This is a Western world. We are the G7. We get to determine who writes the rules of the game.” Indeed, Obama, you know, a good guy on the spectrum of what we have in foreign policy, said, “Let’s write the rules of trade for Asia, but not have China write any of those rules. The U.S. will write the rules.” This is an incredibly naive and dangerous and outmoded way to understand the world. We in the United States are 4.2% of the world’s population. We do not run the world. We are not world leader. We are a country of 4.2% of the people in a big, diverse world, and we should learn to get along, play in the sandbox peacefully, not demand that we have all the toys in the sandbox. And we’re not over that thinking yet. And unfortunately, it’s both political parties. It’s what motivates Speaker Pelosi to go to Taiwan in the middle of all of this, as if she really had to go to stir up the tensions. But it’s the mindset that the U.S. is in charge. JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I wanted to go back a little bit to — back into the 1990s. You recall, I’m sure, the enormous financial collapse that occurred in Mexico in the 1990s, where the Clinton administration authorized $50 billion in a bailout to Mexico, which was really to Wall Street investors. At the time, you were advising the post-Soviet Russian government, which also had a financial — had deep financial problems at the time but was unable to get any significant Western assistance, even from the International Monetary Fund. And you were critical of that at the time. I’m wondering if you could talk about the differences how the U.S. responded to the Mexico crisis versus the Russian financial crisis, and what the roots of that may have been in what the current situation is in Russia today. JEFFREY SACHS: Absolutely. And I had a controlled experiment, because I was economic adviser both to Poland and to the Soviet Union in the last year of President Gorbachev and to President Yeltsin in the first two years of Russian independence, 1992, ’93. My job was finance, to actually help Russia find a way to address, as you described it, a massive financial crisis. And my basic recommendation in Poland, and then in Soviet Union and in Russia, was: To avoid a societal crisis and a geopolitical crisis, the rich Western world should help to tamp down this extraordinary financial crisis that was taking place with the breakdown of the former Soviet Union. Well, interestingly, in the case of Poland, I made a series of very specific recommendations, and they were all accepted by the U.S. government — creating a stabilization fund, canceling part of Poland’s debts, allowing many financial maneuvers to get Poland out of the difficulty. And, you know, I patted myself on the back. “Oh, look at this!” I make a recommendation, and one of them, for a billion dollars, stabilization fund, was accepted within eight hours by the White House. So, I thought, “Pretty good.” Then came the analogous appeal on behalf of, first, Gorbachev, in the final days, and then President Yeltsin. Everything I recommended, which was on the same basis of economic dynamics, was rejected flat out by the White House. I didn’t understand it, I have to tell you, at the time. I said, “But it worked in Poland.” And they’d stare at me blankly. In fact, an acting secretary of state in 1992 said, “Professor Sachs, it doesn’t even matter whether I agree with you or not. It’s not going to happen.” And it took me, actually, quite a while to understand the underlying geopolitics. Those were exactly the days of Cheney and Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld and what became the Project for the New American Century, meaning for the continuation of American hegemony. I didn’t see it at the moment, because I was thinking as an economist, how to help overcome a financial crisis. But the unipolar politics was taking shape, and it was devastating. Of course, it left Russia in a massive financial crisis that led to a lot of instability that had its own implications for years to come. But even more than that, what these people were planning, early on, despite explicit promises to Gorbachev and Yeltsin, was the expansion of NATO. And Clinton started the expansion of NATO with the three countries of Central Europe — Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic — and then George W. Bush Jr. added seven countries — Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and the three Baltic states — but right up against Russia. And then, in 2008, the coup de grâce, which was the U.S. insistence, over the private opposition of the European leaders — and European leaders talked to me privately about it at the time. But in 2008, Bush said NATO will expand to Ukraine and to Georgia. And again, if you take out a map and look at the Black Sea, the explicit goal was to surround Russia in the Black Sea. By the way, it’s an old playbook. It’s the same playbook as Palmerston in 1853 to 1856 in the first Crimean War: surround Russia in the Black Sea, cut off its ability to have a military presence and to project any kind of influence into the eastern Mediterranean. Brzezinski himself said in 1997 that Ukraine would be the geographic pivot for Eurasia. So, what these neocons were doing in the early 1990s was building the U.S. unipolar world. And they were already contemplating lots of wars in order to take out the former Soviet-allied countries — wars to overthrow Saddam, wars to overthrow Assad, wars to overthrow Gaddafi. Those were all rolled out in the next 20 years. They’ve been a complete disaster, debacle for those countries, horrible for the United States, trillions of dollars wasted. But it was a plan. And that neoconservative plan is in its heyday right now on two fronts: in the Ukraine front and on the Taiwan Strait front. And it’s extraordinarily dangerous, what these people are doing to American foreign policy, which hardly is, you know, a policy of democracy. It’s a policy of a small group that has the idea that a unipolar world and U.S. hegemony is the way that we need to go. AMY GOODMAN: Jeffrey Sachs, we don’t have much time, but since this was such a big issue — Naomi Klein took you on big time with The Shock Doctrine, talking about you recommending shock therapy. Can you draw a line between what happened as the Russian economy unraveled to the conditions leading up to the Ukraine invasion? I mean, how did the economic catastrophe that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union lead to the rise of the oligarchic class and, indeed, the presidency of Vladimir Putin? JEFFREY SACHS: Yeah, I’ve tried to explain to Naomi, whom I admire a great deal, for years that what I was recommending was financial help to — whether it was Poland or to the Soviet Union or to Russia. I was absolutely aghast at the cheating and the corruption and the giveaways. And I said so very explicitly at the time and resigned over it, both because I was useless in trying to get Western help and also because I did not like at all what was going on. And I would say that the failure of an orderly approach, which was achieved in Poland but failed in the former Soviet Union because there was no Western constructive engagement, definitely played a role in the instability in the 1990s, definitely played a role in the rise of the oligarch class. In fact, I was absolutely explaining to the U.S. and to the IMF and the World Bank in 1994, '95, what was going on. They didn't care, because they thought, “Well, that’s OK. That’s for Yeltsin, perhaps,” all of that cheating in the shares-for-loans process. Having said all of that, it was a — AMY GOODMAN: We have less than a minute. JEFFREY SACHS: OK. Having said all of that, I think what is important to say is that there is no linear determinism, even from events like that, which were destabilizing and very unhappy and unnecessary, to what is happening now, because when President Putin came in, he was not anti-European, he was not anti-American. What he saw, though, was the incredible arrogance of the United States, the expansion of NATO, the wars in Iraq, the covert war in Syria, the war in Libya, against the U.N. resolution. So, we created so much of what we’re facing right now through our own ineptitude and arrogance. There was no linear determination. It was step-by-step U.S. arrogance that has helped to bring us to where we are today. AMY GOODMAN: Jeffrey Sachs, economist and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, president of the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network, has served as adviser to three U.N. secretaries-general. I want to thank you so much for being with us, joining us from Austria, where he’s attending a conference. Coming up, we will look at — we will talk to a reporter who’s documented how, over the last year, the U.S. has approved just 123 Afghan humanitarian parole applications. Compare that to 68,000 approved applications from Ukrainians in recent months. Stay with us. Jeffrey Sachs is director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, president of the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network, sustainable development solutions advocate under Secretary-General António Guterres, and former adviser to three U.N. secretaries-general.

By Naomi Serviss / New York City Why would anyone spend a hundred bucks on a DNA test for a dog? I know, I know. It’s a touchy subject, and a First World concern by any standard. Some dog owners relish reeling off and regaling friends with Miss Thang’s bone-a-fides. Others are happy to adopt a pound mutt or acquire a pup from friends or through word-of-mouth. Their attitude? Pedigree, Shmedigree. Does it matter from which bitch our pets popped? Who cares what percentage of shepherd or poodle is in the mix? It’s a wash, gauging by the result of my unofficial Central Park Dog Friends Survey. Curiosity is the driving factor. My friend Eve adopted irresistible Lily, a smallish dog with a curly ginger coat, framing expressive eyes and an endearing underbite. Lily lived with a family unable to keep her and after Eve took one look, the deal was sealed. Eve decided to have Lily’s DNA tested after her cousin Ellen traced her own rescue and relayed how much fun it was to learn what breeds her pet descended from. Eve was soon intrigued, then ordered a test for Lily. “I was curious about her history,” Eve whispered, like she was spilling state secrets. “And it sounded fun,” she added. Lily, who looks poodle-y, isn’t! Au contraire. Lily comes from a motley stew: Bichon, Yorkie, Pekingese, Lhasa Apso and Shih Tzu. “I was convinced she was part poodle!” exclaimed Eve. The DNA test, Embark, requires gently swabbing your dog’s mouth for 20 seconds with a Q-tip-like device. The swab is placed in the pre-stamped envelope included in the kit and off it goes to the lab. Results are emailed. Dog adoptions went through the roof at the pandemic’s peak. Shelters were swamped with needy dog lovers armed with multiple references and applications. Sometimes home visits by the agency were required! Strict requirements and a lengthy vetting process made it more difficult to adopt. I should know. I’d been searching for an apartment-friendly pup for a few years. Every morning, I’d scour Petfinder.com, hoping for “The One” to pause my search. Not so lucky on Petfinder, but when my friend Janice suggested the Humane Society, I realized it was the one shelter I had overlooked! After a few weeks, I was matched last November with a 10-pound Maltese (so I was informed) named Petunia. Petunia had been removed from the home of a “Queens woman who had too many dogs,” I was told by the Society’s Manhattan director. That was all the information offered. Frankly, I scoffed at the idea of a purebred from a shelter. No offense intended! But I couldn’t have cared less about the tribe(s) this squirmy, whitish dog with eye stains came from. She was bedraggled, her coat unkempt. Petunia wasn’t a beauty, but her tiny stature was perfect for one-bedroom apartment life. Her gregariousness and social butterfly personality made her a favorite at the shelter. My application vetted, references checked, I passed the audition and soon this pint-sized pup would join our tribe. Neither my husband Lew nor I were sold on keeping her original name. We made the tough decision to replace it. Fortunately, she quickly mastered her moniker change and now responds to: Janis (spelled in honor of Ms. Joplin) My spunky little rock star, wins two- and four-legged friends alike during our Central Park outings. Janis sparks joy in everyone she meets and greets. Eve, a park pal and fellow dog owner, suggested that I join the DNA club for fun. I balked, but curiosity won out. Park friends (with pure-bred dogs) suggested Janis was probably part Havanese or Bichon. Definitely not a pure-bred. From a shelter? Possible, but unlikely. So, my husband and I took the plunge, holding Janis still enough to twirl the swab around her inner cheeks for 20 seconds. Sounds easy. It was a two-person job. Janis could be a Heinz 57 Varieties mutt and we wouldn’t bat an eyelash. This entire episode reminded me of my mother’s claim to Jewish Spanish royalty, We theoretically descended (maternal side) from Spanish royalty expelled during 1492. And we’re Sephardic Jews. My grandmother’s surname was Janis. That fable was repeated ad nauseum for years (with great gravitas) sans documents, corroboration or photos. Zilch. But still, it was a romantic notion, having a storied pedigree. What if there were an iota of truth to the fable? Fun bragging rights! (Unspoken, of course.) Which explains why I decided to take a 23andMe DNA test. A royal connection would be a novel conversation starter during my upcoming 50th high school reunion! I could casually mention the Royal Family’s woes, what with Princes William and Harry on the outs. Then segue into, “You guys won’t believe this, but…” Regardless, ‘tis not to be. My DNA results: 100% Ashkenazi Jew On the other hand, Janis’ results? 100% Maltese. Go figure. Naomi Serviss is a New York-based award-winning journalist whose work has been published in The New York Times, Newsday, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Highroads (AAA magazine), in-flight publications, spa and travel magazines and websites, including BroadwayWorld.com

The Insider: Hi Ruth! Thanks for agreeing to this interview. Ruth: Of course The Insider: Let me just ask you a few questions about yourself before we start. Where do you live? Ruth: In northern New Jersey, about 20 minutes from Manhattan The Insider: What type of work do you do? Ruth: I am a retired attorney. Now I do volunteer legal work on immigration matters and voting rights The Insider: And a little about your family situation, please? Are you married? Do you have kids? Ruth: I am married with four daughters ages 35-42 The Insider: You’re a real journalistic hero for agreeing to talk with us when you’re not well. You have Covid now, right? How are you feeling? Ruth: I do. I am feeling okay. I have a bad sore throat, a slight fever and headache, and some congestion The Insider: I’m sorry to hear that! How long have you been sick? Ruth: Four days. The Insider: Do you have any idea how you caught it? Ruth: My daughter and son-in-law were at an outdoor event on Sunday August 14. Everyone had tested prior to the event, but on August 15, the host called to say she had tested positive for Covid. I had been helping my daughter with her newborn, so I believe I contracted it from them. The Insider: Oh, no! That’s awful! How old is the baby? Ruth: Two months The Insider: Is the baby sick, too? Ruth: Yes, but he hasn’t been tested The Insider: What kind of symptoms does he have? Ruth: Slight fever and a little cranky but is generally doing okay. The Insider: That sounds like an impossible situation! How is it possible for your daughter to take care of the baby and get better herself? Ruth: We have been taking turns caring for the baby. When my daughter got sick, she stayed at home while her husband and the baby came to New Jersey so we could care for him. By the time her husband got sick, my daughter was feeling better so he went home and she came to New Jersey to care for the baby. My symptoms have been fairly mild, so I’ve been able to help out. The Insider: Has your own husband caught it, too? Ruth: No, he has been quarantining and is negative The Insider: That’s fortunate! Are the rest of you still testing positive for Covid? Ruth: Yes. We all still have symptoms. The Insider: Oh, no! That’s such a tricky situation! Have you been conferring with a doctor? Ruth: Yes The Insider: Remotely? Ruth: Yes, via Zoom The Insider: What type of doctor or doctors? Ruth: I am speaking to my internist. My daughter has conferred with her internist and the pediatrician for the baby The pediatrician advised what symptoms to look for, the proper dosage of infant Tylenol and when it would be necessary to bring the baby in. My doctor has said to treat the symptoms and advised on how long to quarantine. The Insider: I’m interested in the fact that the baby hasn’t been tested. Would a home test work? Ruth: One can do a home test on an infant but swabbing a baby’s nose is difficult. The pediatrician said that given the fact that all of the baby’s caregivers have Covid, it is likely the baby has it too and nothing in particular is gained from testing. At the moment, it’s simply cold symptoms. Were that to change, we would bring him in and he would be tested at that time. The Insider: That makes good sense. Of course, readers will be interested in the fact that the hostess ended up testing positive after taking a test! Can you describe that a little more? Did she take a home test or a PCR? Ruth: She took both a rapid test and a PCR . The Insider: Wow! That doesn’t give you a lot of confidence in the accuracy of testing! Also, it was an outside event! You can’t be more careful than that, right? Ruth: I think everyone is aware that testing captures a moment in time and therefore is not a guarantee. We have all been extremely careful, but to avoid any risk at all means not doing anything with others. If you take any risk, you could turn out to be unlucky. I think that is the case here. This is the first time any of us has had Covid. The Insider: I’m sure that your daughter was especially careful beforehand! Was this her first social event since giving birth? Ruth: Yes The Insider: So unfair! Ruth: Yes, but thankfully no one is terribly ill. The Insider: Yes! I guess the $64 million question is how do you avoid reinfecting each other now? Ruth: We have been quarantining from one another and masking when we care for the baby. We each prepare our own food. The Insider: Wow! What date did your daughter get sick? Ruth: August 20. She is past the recommended quarantine period but we are still being very careful The Insider: Are any of the adults taking any medicine? Ruth: No one is taking antivirals. We are using over-the-counter medicines to treat symptoms. The Insider: Were the three of you vaxxed and boosted? Ruth: Yes. Everyone has been vaccinated and boosted. The Insider: I would guess that the vaxxing and boosting made the difference as to why none of you is very sick. But every time we run a story about someone getting Covid under those circumstances, someone will write in and say, See! Vaccinations don’t work! Ruth: Of course they work! In 2020, I would likely have been hospitalized with this. I’m 70 with asthma. The Insider: Is this your first grandchild? Ruth: Yes he is. The Insider: Such a tale of the times! I hope that you and the rest of your family are soon in tip-top shape! Thanks so much for doing this interview. Be well! Ruth: Thank you!

Fred Plotkin, a pleasure activist and passionate Italy and culinary expert, speaks each Friday with leading people in the arts FRED PLOTKIN is one of America’s foremost experts on opera and has distinguished himself in many fields as a writer, speaker, consultant and as a compelling teacher. He is an expert on everything Italian, the person other so-called Italy experts turn to for definitive information.  Fred discovered the concept of "The Renaissance Man" as a small child and has devoted himself to pursuing that ideal as the central role of his life. In a “Public Lives” profile in The New York Times on August 30, 2002, Plotkin was described as "one of those New York word-of-mouth legends, known by the cognoscenti for his renaissance mastery of two seemingly separate disciplines: music and the food of Italy." In the same publication, on May 11, 2006, it was written that "Fred is a New Yorker, but has the soul of an Italian."

By Jessie Seigel / Washington, D.C. In the Sunshine State, the Senate race is already blazing. Last Tuesday (Aug. 23), after easily winning the Democratic nomination for Senate in Florida, Rep. Val Demings, 65, the first female police chief of the Orlando police department. came out swinging: We're not going back. We're not. There are women and men, and people of all races and ages who suffered, bled, and died for us to have the constitutional rights that we enjoy. We're not going back to being treated like second-class citizens. We're not going back to being treated like property. We will continue to fight and fight and fight some more for a woman's right to choose and you believe in that America. Demings, a third-term congresswoman, is challenging Florida’s popular current senator, conservative Republican Marco Rubio, 51, who has held that seat since 2011. If she wins, Demings would become the first Black senator in Florida’s history. Rubio, born in Miami to Cuban parents, served as speaker of the Florida House of Representatives before being elected to the U.S. Senate in 2010. In 2015, he sought the Republican candidacy for president, but subsequently suspended his campaign after losing the Florida primary to Donald Trump. Backtracking, he successfully ran for re-election to the Senate instead. Rubio has been a consistent Trump ally ever since. Florida is one of the most politically divided states in the country, its last three governors’ races being decided by one percentage point or less. Nevertheless, in 2016, Rubio won re-election by almost eight percentage points. For the first time in modern history, Florida has more registered Republicans than Democrats. Florida’s race this year may not be the Democrats' top priority; they may see Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Ohio and North Carolina as stronger opportunities to pick up a treasured Senate seat because of the GOP’s choice of ultra-extreme candidates in those states. But failure to make Florida a priority along with these other states would be short-sighted. Like those other states, the Florida senate seat could ensure the Democrats’ continued control of the Senate. With that body currently split 50-50 between parties, Democrats currently maintain control only because of the Vice President’s ability to break ties. Loss of even one Democratic seat would give control to the GOP. Demings is proving to be a force to be reckoned with. As one of her campaign staff members bragged to the press a day after her win, “She’s fierce, strong, tough, she’s no-nonsense, she tells it like it is.” Demings’ campaign is trying to reinforce this view of her with an image of Rubio as weak and slick. According to the Federal Election Commission as of August 23, Demings has out-fundraised Marco Rubio—raising $47 million as opposed to Rubio’s $36 million. A poll of likely voters conducted by the nonpartisan Center Street PAC from August 12-14, had Rubio with 52 percent of support as opposed to Demings’ 41 percent. But a University of North Florida poll, conducted August 8-12, found Demings holding a four-point lead over Rubio—48 percent for Demings versus 44 percent for Rubio. At a minimum, these varying numbers in roughly the same time period suggest that the state’s voters may be up for grabs. Furthermore, Demings’ appealing backstory makes her a strong candidate. She is one of seven children; her father was a janitor and her mother a maid, giving her strong working-class cred to draw voters. Demings spent 27 years in the Orlando Police Department and was the department’s first female chief from 2007-2011. During her tenure as police chief, there was an impressive 40% decrease in violent crime. Further enhancing her resume, Demings was selected by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to serve as one of the impeachment managers in the first Senate trial of Donald Trump, and was on the short list to be Joe Biden’s vice-presidential running mate in 2020. The Supreme Court’s evisceration of Roe v. Wade in June has made women’s rights over their own bodies and civil rights in general increasingly important midterm issues. Demings’ positions on those matters are clear. In various years, she has received 100 percent voting scores from the ACLU, NARAL Pro-Choice America and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund. While maintaining that gun control legislation is not about taking guns away from responsible law-abiding people, Demings supported the Gun Violence Restraining Order Act of 2017, which would have provided for temporary confiscation of firearms from people thought to be a threat to themselves or others. In an act of obvious sanity, she has also opposed arming teachers, whom she has maintained would find themselves “outskilled and outgunned” in a shooter situation. The GOP may attempt to use those firearms stands against her. But they will find Demings’ bona fides concerning law enforcement are unassailable. Echoing a frequent campaign theme of hers that is likely to be repeated often this fall, Demings said to the crowd after her win, “Together, I really do believe this daughter of a maid and janitor who is not supposed to be standing here tonight — I really do believe that together we can do anything.” The Democratic Party needs to believe that too, and make her race as much a priority as those in any of the swing states. Democracy needs every Democratic win it can get. Political columnist Jessie Seigel had a long career as a government attorney in which she honed her analytic skills. She has also twice received an Artist’s Fellowship from the Washington, D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her fiction, and has been a finalist for a number of literary awards. In addition, Seigel is an associate editor at the Potomac Review, a reviewer for The Washington Independent Review of Books, and a dabbler in political cartoons at Daily Kos. Of this balance in her work between the analytic and the imaginative, Seigel jokes, “I guess my right and left brains are well-balanced.” More on and from Seigel can be found at The Adventurous Writer, https://www.jessieseigel.com.

By John Rolfe / Red Hook, N.Y. I have mixed feelings about President Biden’s decision last Wednesday to forgive some student loans. On one hand, with student debt totaling $1.6 trillion (about $25,000 per person), it’s good that people making less than $125,000 a year will be given $10,000 worth of relief. Low-income borrowers who used Pell Grants will get up to $20,000 of forgiveness. On the other hand, it’s not good that the move creates a $300 billion federal budget hole that taxpayers will have to fill. Moreover, people who struggled and paid off their loans feel cheated and a message has been sent that repaying them may not be necessary if you can hold out long enough. Last, but certainly not least, this new debt relief is only a band-aid that does nothing to make education more affordable in the long run. Facts of life: College is awfully expensive. According to the Education Data Initiative, the average annual tuition at public schools is $9,349 for in-state students and $27,023 for those who live out-of-state. Attending a private college will set you back $35,852 each year, and that’s low when some schools, such as my alma mater (Bard College) charge upwards of $80,000. Education is a big business. Many institutions of higher learning are for-profit enterprises. They will raise prices and do what they must to remain profitable. So it’s no surprise that, adjusted for inflation, tuition has increased 747.8% since 1963. At some point, students (and the rest of us as well) must learn to live realistically in America’s economic world. As it is, we have been thoroughly conditioned to buy now, pay later. Debt.org’s data shows that the average American adult is now $90,460 in the red, a record high, with most people unable to cover a few hundred dollars-worth of unexpected expenses. Credit cards and loans are in our cultural DNA. They immediately give us what we want while they kick the pain-and-stress can over the hill and out of sight. Eventually, though, we reach that can. By then, thanks to interest and fees, it costs us a lot more than it would have if we had paid first and not punted. As my wife Victoria Rolfe — who writes about frugal living and does family budget counseling — well knows, people look at you like you’re from Mars when you tell them they can live comfortably without depending on credit, loans and leases. But that requires thinking long-term and being patient and resourceful now so you don’t have to sweat later. Take the time to set things up right and you’ll free yourself from a lot of trouble down the road. Victoria and I sent our four kids to the halls of higher academe, and all four emerged without debt. Here’s how: My stepson Sean, our oldest, opted to move to North Carolina after high school, live with his biological father, and become a resident, which meant his tuition at state schools would be reasonable. His degree in Asian studies and biology at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill was only $6,000 a year, which he paid off by working basic retail jobs and with some help from us. Winning a full scholarship in 2000 enabled him to eventually get a doctorate in psychology at the University of Buffalo for free. He went on to teach cognitive psychology at Buffalo’s satellite campus in Singapore, his rent paid by the school. Colin, our next in line, went to our affordable local community college (Dutchess) for his first two years. There’s really no sense in overpaying for basic, required courses at a pricey school when the credits are transferable. Colin lived at home and saved substantially on dorm and meal costs. He eventually transferred to nearby SUNY-New Paltz in 2011 and earned a BA in English Literature, continuing to live at home while working in a supermarket and contributing to his tuition. We helped him, sure, but with amounts we could handle because we had set them aside in advance. He now works as an editor and book designer for Monkfish Publishing in Rhinebeck, NY. Our daughter Amber followed essentially the same path in 2011: community college and then a reasonably priced state school: SUNY-Oneonta, where she completed a degree in fashion merchandising. Needing a dorm cost more, but Amber worked at an Old Navy and contributed. We helped. No loans needed. She now works as a hair stylist. Jesse, our youngest, saved our bacon by winning a full four-year ride at Ithaca College in 2013, eventually earning a degree in cinematography and photography that he used to secure work in film production. But if he hadn’t gotten that scholarship, I’m sure we would have found a way to get him a degree without going into debt. I understand that not everyone has family or friends who can help them, and education can be an immediate necessity. But students can save themselves a lot of agony by pursuing degrees that are practical and in-demand, and realizing that while some colleges can help you enter your chosen field — I definitely needed a master’s degree from Columbia Graduate School of Journalism because my creative writing BA from Bard was a ticket to starvation — it often doesn't matter where you went to school when it comes time to apply for a job. It would also help if America’s education system transformed itself so that going to college is not seen as the ultimate goal for all. Practical trade skills such as plumbing, electric, and auto repair, and hands-on experience via internships, should be given greater emphasis. Quite often, we end up in a field that is different than the one we planned to enter when we went to college, and much of our most valuable learning occurs on the job while we make contacts who help further our career. No loans required. Biden can try to bail us out all he wants, but it’s only going to be a temporary fix — “fix” as in a shot of heroin for an addict. We really don’t have to live on a mountain of debt, whether it comes from school or life in general. It’s a matter of choice more often than we realize. Ultimately, change is up to each of us, especially when it comes to education. John Rolfe is a former senior editor for Sports Illustrated for Kids, a longtime columnist for the Poughkeepsie Journal/USA Today Network, and author of The Goose in the Bathroom: Stirring Tales of Family Life. His school bus drivin’ blog “Hellions, Mayhem and Brake Failure” is parked on his website Celestialchuckle.com (https://celestialchuckle.com) with the meter running.

One film journalist’s stream-of-consciousness cinematic journey through the pandemic, Part 98 By Laurence Lerman / New York City For me, the ninth month of the year often plays out as a four-week farewell to the summer, a season that has left me a little parched and a little sunburnt, as well as happily content when an evening or two were spent cooling down in an air-conditioned movie theater, with an engaging or at least highly anticipated movie flickering on the screen. That summery mood frequently holds over into the new month, particularly the first week or two, but the movies, well, they might not be what I’ve been looking for. Or I might not even have heard of them! Welcome to September, or what the film community lovingly refers to as a dump month. There are several periods of the year when the American movie industry has lower commercial and critical expectations for its newest theatrical releases. Those times are usually January, February and September, months when domestic audiences are smaller than other months. At these times, studios and distributors “dump” movies they’re not overly excited about into movie houses with little or no fanfare. The streaming era has altered this practice a bit, yes, but there’s a corporate feeling that dropping some of the films on the screen during a dump month is the best way to satisfy contractual obligations to the films’ producers and to get some review quotes and exposure (limited) before their inevitable streaming debuts. January and February find new movie releases in theaters coming up against the. reality of a consumer base paying off their holiday season debts, staying more physically active to shed those holiday pounds, getting pumped for the NFL playoffs and Super Bowl and more. September, meanwhile, is the month following the biggest season for moviegoers, many of whom are going back to school, paying off tuition fees and just feeling exhausted from a season of regular moviegoing. There are myriad explanations, all ending with the same result: lesser-known movies arriving with less of an identity. But there are still some tasty goodies out there. I look at early September as a great time to read up on a month of new films that haven’t been getting much pre-release buzz for the simple fact that not enough people know about them. Let me remedy that now with a look at 10 films hitting theaters coast-to-coast in September. Sure, I’m familiar with some of them and you probably are, too. But that doesn’t stop the sensation of stepping into the celluloid unknown to be very exhilarating. Occasionally. Peter Von Kant (Sept. 2) Based on the late German master R.W. Fassbinder’s 1972 arthouse classic The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant, France’s François Ozon flips the story upside-down and reframes it as a tale about a man. A famous movie director, Peter Von Kant lives with his assistant Karl, whom he likes to mistreat and humiliate. Then he meets a handsome young man whom he offers to help break into the world of cinema. And then things begin to get really weird… Co-starring the divine Isabelle Adjani and the great Hanna Schygulla, star of Fassbinder’s original film. Medieval (Sept. 9) This historical action-drama is based on the true story of a Jan Žižka, a medieval Czech general and mercenary who led his comrades in bloodthirsty battles against a corrupt monarchy and created quite a name for himself in the annals of European military history. An English-language Czech production written and directed by Petr Jákl, it is an epic that stars Ben Foster, Michael Caine, Sophie Lowe and the always badass Til Schweiger. House of Darkness (Sept. 9) Justin Long and Kate Bosworth star in the latest offering from the always provocative writer/director Neil Labute (Your Friends and Neighbors, Nurse Betty). It’s a seductive thriller-horror-comedy mash-up that follows a Lothario (Long) who hooks up with a beautiful, mysterious date at his local bar (Bosworth), only for their seemingly casual coupling to take a sinister (but sexy!) turn. Clerks III (Sept. 16) Again? In the third entry of filmmaker Kevin Smith’s low-rent buddy franchise, series regulars Dante (Brian O’Halloran), Elias (Trevor Fehrman), Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Smith himself) are enlisted by their ailing buddy Randal (Jeff Anderson) to make a movie about the convenience store that started it all. Rosario Dawson and Marilyn Ghigliotti return as the coolest women these guys will ever know. The Woman King (Sept. 16) The talented filmmaker Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love and Basketball, The Secret Life of Bees, The Old Guard) continues to demonstrate her range with this epic adventure story of the Agojie, an all-female regiment of warriors who relied on their formidable skills and fierceness to protect the African Kingdom of Dahomey in the 19th century. The indefatigable Viola King stars here as the Agojie’s equally tireless General Nanisca, who readies the next generation of recruits for battle against an encroaching enemy determined to destroy their way of life. See How They Run (Sept. 16) In this mystery-comedy set in London’s West End of the 1950s, the plans for a movie adaption of a smash-hit play come to an abrupt halt after a member of the crew is murdered. World-weary Inspector Stoppard (Sam Rockwell) and eager rookie Constable Stalker (Saoirse Ronan) take on the case, and quickly discover that dealing with the supposedly glamorous world of actors in their natural theatrical habitat is easier said than done. First-time feature director Tom George is at the helm. Confess, Fletch (Sept. 16) Jon Hamm steps into the shoes originally worn by Chevy Chase twice in the 1980s in this third film adaption of a Gregory MacDonald novel featuring his wisecracking investigative reporter Irwin “Fletch” Fletcher. In this latest comedic adventure, Fletch must prove his innocence after he becomes the prime suspect in a string of murders. Directed by seasoned comedy helmer Greg Mottola, (Superbad, Paul, The Daytrippers), it co-stars Annie Mumolo, Kyle MacLachlan, Marcia Gay Harden and Hamm’s former Mad Men compadre John Slattery. Don’t Worry Darling (Sept. 23) The Truman Show meets Gaslight, or that’s at least what this psychological thriller looks like. The always-game Florence Pugh and Harry Styles are a young happy couple in the 1950s who live in a seemingly perfect town that has been created by the mysterious company Harry is working for. But when cracks in their idyllic life begin to appear, Florence senses that there might be something spooky going on behind the ball games and barbecues. Olivia Wilde, Styles’ girlfriend, directs and co-stars. Catherine Called Birdy (Sept. 23) In this picturesque adventure, a 14-year-old girl in medieval England, the youngest child of a noble family, navigates her way through her adolescence while trying to avoid a group of potential suitors that her father has in mind for her. Directed and co-written by Lena Dunham and starring the wonderful Bella Ramsey (the pint-sized royal Lyanna Mormont from Game of Thrones), this family-friendly film is based on the 1994 children’s novel by well-known historical fiction writer Karen Cushman The Good House (Sept. 30) Sigourney Weaver and Kevin Kline reunite for their first on-screen pairing since 1997’s The Ice Storm (and, before that, 1993’s Dave) in this adaptation of Ann Leary’s 2013 bestselling novel. It’s a romantic comedy-drama that follows a secretive New England realtor (Weaver), the descendant of the Salem witches, whose carefully managed life begins to unravel when she rekindles a romance with her old high-school flame (Kline) from New York. Morena Baccarin and Rob Delaney co-star. Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.

By Andy Borowitz August 29, 2022 PITTSBURGH (The Borowitz Report)—Eating classified documents was “an essential part of President Donald Trump’s super-healthy diet,” Dr. Mehmet Oz has claimed. Oz, the longtime television host and, more recently, Pennsylvania’s G.O.P. nominee for the U.S. Senate, said that “classified documents, including the nuclear codes, provided the roughage necessary to keep President Trump’s digestive system humming along at the highest possible level.” Speaking at a campaign stop in Pittsburgh, Oz said that Trump’s diet consisted of “the four food groups: the hamburger group, the ketchup group, the Coca-Cola group, and the classified-documents group.” “Looking at President Trump, you might wonder what miracle diet made him such a fine physical specimen,” Oz said. “It turns out that national-security documents are not only loaded with secrets—they’re chock-full of fibre.”

By Alan Resnick / Detroit In 1972, Roger Kahn wrote The Boys of Summer, considered by many to be one of the greatest baseball books of all time. The book is about young men learning to play baseball in the 1930s and 1940s, going on to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers, and their lives after baseball. Well, my friends and I were boys of summer, too, albeit from a different generation and not professional ballplayers. But we did share the love of the game and the camaraderie it provided. We spent our summers together as kids and as teens playing pickup baseball games, typically twice a day, separated only by a break for lunch. I played so much baseball in the summer as a youth that I had two separate wardrobes, one for my svelter frame during summer and husky-sized pants for my sedentary fall and winter months. On Sunday, August 28, some 40 guys left their AARP cards at home and got together at a ballfield in Farmington Hills, Mich., to become the boys of summer again. The event was the Oak Park, Mich. Old-Timers’ Softball Tournament XI. Joel Noble and Sheldon Rosenberg, two of my classmates from the Oak Park High School class of 1969, came up with the idea for this tournament back in spring, 2010. Joel suggested to Sheldon that they try to scrounge up maybe 10 former classmates for a pick-up ballgame, just to have some fun and relive old times. Joel proposed that the game be hardball (baseball), but Sheldon’s response was, “Do you want to get someone killed?” So they decided on softball and posted their idea on Facebook. They were overwhelmed by the response. I was one of 42 players who signed up, the majority from our graduating class, with the rest mainly from the two classes adjacent to ours. Players were split into three teams and play was based on a round robin format. Joel and Sheldon did not expect that there would be much interest in the game beyond the players. But, boy, were they wrong. As word got out, they were flooded with requests for the date, time, and location of the game. When game day finally arrived, there was a DJ spinning oldies, a photographer, and free ice cream. The game has since become a local staple of summer, with hiatuses in 2020 and 2021 due to Covid. It quickly became clear to me that out inaugural game was not simply a chance for old friends to renew acquaintances and toss the ball around. Instead, 40 years of pent-up competitive juices began to flow. Guys who could still fit into their old uniforms showed up in them, wearing metal spikes. There was aggressive base running and hard slides. But some things also happened during the inaugural game that clearly demonstrated we were no longer teenagers, but rather sixtysomethings. One friend ruptured his Achilles tendon pushing out of the batter’s box. Another tripped over first base attempting to beat out an infield grounder and ended up requiring shoulder surgery. And then there were the assorted guys who pulled up lame attempting to stretch a single into a double. They limped off the field supported on their kids’ shoulders. These sort of things did not happen “back in the day.” With each passing year, more and more guys signed up to play, reaching a high of 65 at one point. But many of the new players were much younger than the core group. For the inaugural game the age difference between the youngest and oldest player was perhaps three or four years, but over time it ballooned up to close to fifteen years. That’s pretty significant when you’re on the higher end of the age range like I was. I played for the first five years before a couple of rotator cuff surgeries put me on the Injured Reserve list. Some friends stopped playing due to hip and knee replacements, while others moved out of state after retiring from their work careers. And some passed away, most notably Joel Noble, in June 2017. Coming to accept that you cannot do something as well as you once did is never easy. In the inaugural game, my head was filled with pipe dreams of jacking one over the fence for a home run. By 2015, however, my thinking had become much more pragmatic–don’t get hurt and don’t embarrass yourself. I started out willing to play any infield position, just as I had when I was younger. But by 2015, I listed catcher as my preferred position. It wasn’t as glamorous or exciting as playing third base, but it required less running and less chance of injury. And I started out sitting in the dugout kibitzing with longtime friends, but now sat in lawn chairs with other former players, classmates, and the spouses, kids, and grandkids of the current players. I attempted a comeback in 2019, as the game was being played on the same weekend as our 50th class reunion. A practice was scheduled one week before the game at the Oak Park Park, where many of us had our greatest glory days as players. I made it through practice, but arrived at two realizations walking back to my car. First, my shoulder hurt like hell from all the throwing I did. Second, the ground balls launched off composite bats were whizzing by me before I could bend down to catch them. I emailed Sheldon and placed myself on the retirement list. So I went this year as a spectator, enjoying the competition and camaraderie vicariously from the stands. Remarkably, about half of this year’s players were in the 2010 game. The youngest player was 57 while the oldest was 76. The ground rules had been adjusted to reflect the realities of aging. Metal cleats or spikes were not allowed. Courtesy runners were permitted if a batter was so fortunate as to reach first base. To protect the catcher from collision, a runner coming home had to run to the right of home plate. And no sliding was permitted. There were plenty of surgical scars, knee braces, and compression bandages on display, and not just on the players. Sheldon has announced that he is giving up his role as Old-Timers Commissioner, which is why many of this year’s emails about the game referred to it as “the last hurrah.” But it would be a sad day if this annual celebration of baseball, friendship, and growing up and old together comes to an end. Alan Resnick is an industrial psychologist with over 40 years of professional experience. He and his wife are sheltering at home in Farmington Hills, Michigan. He is passing the time by cooking, exercising, catching up on friends’ recommendations of must-see TV and writing.

By Bonnie Fishman / San Francisco Bay Area I’m on a mission to revive an overlooked practice of Americana: porch sitting. What is that, you say? Well, just what it states: sitting on your porch or stoop. The porch is the threshold of your private space and the outside world. It’s where folks have been visiting and gathering for decades in this country. Put down your cell phones and your tablets. Reach out to your neighbors or a passerby. Flag them down for a sit-down and a chat. Bring out some refreshments, and actually talk to people face-to-face. Porch sitting is a predominantly summer event but in warmer climates, it can take place most of the year, like here in California. Back in 2006, NPR’s All Things Considered featured a segment on summer porch sitting. Their headline: “Sitting on the Porch: Not a Place But a State of Mind.” In my opinion, that is the essence of parking yourself in a comfy chair, chillin’, while watching the world go by. Add a few folks to join in for conversation, you’re really living the life. Back in the 1800s, Andrew Jackson Downing, a famous landscaper, envisioned a way to make American houses different from their British predecessors. Adding a porch became an important element of that design. Porches served people well before air conditioning came along. The interiors of their homes were suffocating, so sitting outside was a matter of comfort as much as conviviality. In the 1950s, when suburbs sprang up all over this country, the backyard became the focus of houses’ outdoor space. In urban areas, though, the porch was still the focus. Now let’s add air conditioning, TV, and computers into the mix. We all seemed to have become shut-ins! I have to say, living in the Detroit suburbs for 35 years really confirmed this observation. Summer would come, and I rarely saw neighbors hanging out in front of their house. Me personally? We had a beautiful deck behind the house overlooking a ravine with lots of trees. No porch sitting for me then. Most outdoor activities happened in our backyards. Believe it or not, there is a Professional Porch Sitting Union, started in jest in Louisville, Ky. in 1999 when Claude Stephens, an enthusiastic front porch sitter, posted an invitation on the Internet to join. On the Union’s Facebook page, its mission statement: “An oasis of calm in a busy day, the porch invites you to sit a spell until you're ready to take on the world again.” Back in Ann Arbor or in any college town, having a great porch was a key element of sociability. There were always fellow students passing by with the possibility of “setting a spell” on your porch. Porches were particularly active on football game days. They would be brimming with students, beer, University of Michigan gear, and snacks. The lively mood was elevated well before the game started. After a game, you could tell if the team won or not by what the porch temperament was. When my husband and I moved to south San Francisco Bay and built a house in 2020, having a grand porch was essential to me. Our house is set back from the road, so our “backyard” space is really in the front. My brother-in-law Ron, who is an architect, designed our porch to be an extension of the house. I live on my porch. I write there, eat some meals, read, do puzzles, grill, entertain, and, of course, porch sit with my neighbors. My husband even does his craft projects out here. It’s fully covered so even if it rains hard (a rare occurrence here in California these days!), we don’t get wet at all. Lucky us, the space is quite large, over 500 square feet, bigger than many Manhattan studio apartments! Are we porch sitters obligated to serve refreshments? At our house, we have so many dogs around it’s hard for us to put food out without having to guard it with our lives. When I bring newcomers to our porch, I do put food out. In an afternoon “sit,” the beverage will commonly be iced tea or sparkling waters. I like to pair that with shortbreads. They come in so many varieties that there are endless combinations. Today, I’m offering Dried Cherry Orange Shortbread Dipped in White Chocolate. You can change the cherries to dried cranberries or the orange to lemon zest. You can also remove the fruit and add mini chocolate chips and/or nuts. These cookies are easy to make. The dough can be made in larger quantities and frozen so when you have unexpected guests, you can whip up a batch. Let us know here at The Insider what you choose to serve at your next porch sit. And most importantly, let’s take a little advice from Mark Twain: “Never put off till tomorrow what may be done day after tomorrow just as well.” So, sit on your porch and relax! Dried Cherry and Orange Shortbread Yield: 4 dozen cookies 8 oz. butter, room temperature 2/3 c. sugar 1 tsp. vanilla zest from 1 orange 1/4 tsp. salt 2 c. flour 3/4 c. dried cherries (or dried cranberries) 1 egg white for finish coarse sugar crystals 2 4 oz. bars of Lindt white chocolate 1 Tbsp. vegetable oil Blend together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Mix in the vanilla, orange zest, and salt.  Beat in the flour. Stir only until the dough begins to come together. Add the cherries. Using your hands, gather the dough together. Spray an 8” x 5” loaf pan with pan release. Line with a large piece of cling wrap. Pack the dough into the pan. Smooth out the top. Wrap in cling film. refrigerate for 8 hours or overnight. It can also be frozen and used at another time. Preheat oven to 350°. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Unwrap the dough. Using a sharp, thin-bladed knife, trim the loaf so that the sides are squared off. Beginning at the short end, slice the loaf into 1/4” slices. Cut the slices in half crosswise. Place them on the cookie sheets with a 1/2” space between cookies. Brush the tops with egg white. Sprinkle with coarse sugar. Bake for 12-14 minutes, until set but not browned.  Cool completely. Break up the white chocolate into the top of a double boiler over simmering water. Stir with a fork. When melted, blend in the oil. Continue stirring until melted and smooth. Dip the short ends of each cookie into the white chocolate. Set the cookies back on the baking sheet. Refrigerate the cookies until the white chocolate is set, about 1 hour. Serve at room temperature. Bonnie Fishman attended the Cordon Bleu Cookery School in London. Later, she owned and operated Bonnie’s Patisserie in Southfield, Mich. and Bonnie’s Kitchen and Catering in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. She has taught cooking for over 35 years and created hundreds of recipes. She is now living in Northern California.

By Laurence Lerman / New York City One of the most fearless photographers of the Vietnam War, Tim Page was a dedicated photog who was wounded four times in the field before he was 25 while snapping pictures with his trusted Leica M camera. Page covered the war regularly from 1965 to 1970, his work appearing in Time and Life magazines, Paris Match and by wire for the news agencies Associated Press and UPI. His photos provided Americans and people around the world with their first and often most powerful perceptions of what was going on in the war zone of that most controversial of conflicts. Page died on Wednesday, August 24, from liver cancer at his home in New South Wales, Australia. He was 78. Kent, Britain-born Page, a free-spirited, bigger-than-life character who left his home at the age of 17 in search of adventure, found freelance work with UPI in early 1965. He quickly made waves with the raw and dangerous photographs he took of an attempted coup in Laos, sterling examples of a photographer getting up-close-and-personal with the dangers of battle. Equally powerful were his non-combat pictures of young GI’s coping with the terrifying world into which they had been thrust when sent to war in Southeast Asia. Page, the inspiration for the drug-addled, unhinged photojournalist portrayed by the equally drug-addled, unhinged actor Dennis Hopper in Francis Coppola’s 1979 Vietnam War epic Apocalypse Now, was also as involved in nearly as many crazed incidents outside of his Vietnam experiences. Many of the other themes featured in Page’s work were drawn from the drug-fueled world of rock’n’roll and hippies, wherein he often traveled with and provided pictures for the work of legendary “gonzo” journalist Hunter S. Thompson. These photos appeared in such outlets as the then-counter-culture magazine Rolling Stone and Crawdaddy. One such event found him arrested for disturbing the peace alongside Jim Morrison of The Doors during a riotous Doors concert in New Haven, Conn. in 1967. (He was released the next day). Other times, when he was working alongside the famously chemically altered Thompson, he would begin his day by gulping down a glass of vodka, an orange and “a handful of pills of various colors—I’ve no idea what they were,” as he told Time in 2013. Page photographed other wars and happenings over the course of his career—his handling of the Six Day War in the Middle East in 1967 was highly lauded—but he remained best known for his Vietnam portfolio. That reputation was cemented over subsequent decades with the publication of various Vietnam collections. Among them are Tim Page’s Nam (1983), The Vietnam War: An Eyewitness History (1992), and NAM: The Vietnam Experience (1995) One of the most highly regarded books was Requiem, a 1997 collection of pictures by 135 photographers from all sides of the conflict who had been killed in various Southeast Asian wars. Requiem was co-written by his fellow photographer Horst Faas and Page thought it be one of his most vital works. Requiem has since been put on permanent display in the Warm Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. “You don’t think of any of those political or cultural issues—you’re out there confronted with whatever horror is going on, so just get on with the job and find the best frame you can,” Page told Time in 2013. “Perhaps that’s why war photography is so strong, because there are no political considerations. You are presented with the rawest of reality in front of you.” Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.

*By Prof. Jeffrey D. Sachs | Other News | August 22, 2022 The world is on the edge of nuclear catastrophe in no small part because of the failure of Western political leaders to be forthright about the causes of the escalating global conflicts. The relentless Western narrative that the West is noble while Russia and China are evil is simple-minded and extraordinarily dangerous. It is an attempt to manipulate public opinion, not to deal with very real and pressing diplomacy. The essential narrative of the West is built into US national security strategy. The core US idea is that China and Russia are implacable foes that are “attempting to erode American security and prosperity.” These countries are, according to the US, “determined to make economies less free and less fair, to grow their militaries, and to control information and data to repress their societies and expand their influence.” The irony is that since 1980 the US has been in at least 15 overseas wars of choice (Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Panama, Serbia, Syria, and Yemen just to name a few), while China has been in none, and Russia only in one (Syria) beyond the former Soviet Union. The US has military bases in 85 countries, China in 3, and Russia in 1 (Syria) beyond the former Soviet Union. President Joe Biden has promoted this narrative, declaring that the greatest challenge of our time is the competition with the autocracies, which “seek to advance their own power, export and expand their influence around the world, and justify their repressive policies and practices as a more efficient way to address today’s challenges.” US security strategy is not the work of any single US president but of the US security establishment, which is largely autonomous, and operates behind a wall of secrecy. The overwrought fear of China and Russia is sold to a Western public through manipulation of the facts. A generation earlier George W. Bush, Jr. sold the public on the idea that America’s greatest threat was Islamic fundamentalism, without mentioning that it was the CIA, with Saudi Arabia and other countries, that had created, funded, and deployed the jihadists in Afghanistan, Syria, and elsewhere to fight America’s wars. Or consider the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1980, which was painted in the Western media as an act of unprovoked perfidy. Years later, we learned that the Soviet invasion was actually preceded by a CIA operation designed to provoke the Soviet invasion! The same misinformation occurred vis-à-vis Syria. The Western press is filled with recriminations against Putin’s military assistance to Syria’s Bashar al-Assad beginning in 2015, without mentioning that the US supported the overthrow of al-Assad beginning in 2011, with the CIA funding a major operation (Timber Sycamore) to overthrow Assad years before Russia arrived. Or more recently, when US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recklessly flew to Taiwan despite China’s warnings, no G7 foreign minister criticized Pelosi’s provocation, yet the G7 ministers together harshly criticized China’s “overreaction” to Pelosi’s trip. The Western narrative about the Ukraine war is that it is an unprovoked attack by Putin in the quest to recreate the Russian empire. Yet the real history starts with the Western promise to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev that NATO would not enlarge to the East, followed by four waves of NATO aggrandizement: in 1999, incorporating three Central European countries; in 2004, incorporating 7 more, including in the Black Sea and Baltic States; in 2008, committing to enlarge to Ukraine and Georgia; and in 2022, inviting four Asia-Pacific leaders to NATO to take aim at China. Nor do the Western media mention the US role in the 2014 overthrow of Ukraine’s pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych; the failure of the Governments of France and Germany, guarantors of the Minsk II agreement, to press Ukraine to carry out its commitments; the vast US armaments sent to Ukraine during the Trump and Biden Administrations in the lead-up to war; nor the refusal of the US to negotiate with Putin over NATO enlargement to Ukraine. Of course, NATO says that is purely defensive, so that Putin should have nothing to fear. In other words, Putin should take no notice of the CIA operations in Afghanistan and Syria; the NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999; the NATO overthrow of Moammar Qaddafi in 2011; the NATO occupation of Afghanistan for 15 years; nor Biden’s “gaffe” calling for Putin’s ouster (which of course was no gaffe at all); nor US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin stating that the US war aim in Ukraine is the weakening of Russia. At the core of all of this is the US attempt to remain the world’s hegemonic power, by augmenting military alliances around the world to contain or defeat China and Russia. It’s a dangerous, delusional, and outmoded idea. The US has a mere 4.2% of the world population, and now a mere 16% of world GDP (measured at international prices). In fact, the combined GDP of the G7 is now less than that of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), while the G7 population is just 6 percent of the world compared with 41 percent in the BRICS. There is only one country whose self-declared fantasy is to be the world’s dominant power: the US. It’s past time that the US recognized the true sources of security: internal social cohesion and responsible cooperation with the rest of the world, rather than the illusion of hegemony. With such a revised foreign policy, the US and its allies would avoid war with China and Russia, and enable the world to face its myriad environment, energy, food and social crises. Above all, at this time of extreme danger, European leaders should pursue the true source of European security: not US hegemony, but European security arrangements that respect the legitimate security interests of all European nations, certainly including Ukraine, but also including Russia, which continues to resist NATO enlargements into the Black Sea. Europe should reflect on the fact that the non-enlargement of NATO and the implementation of the Minsk II agreements would have averted this awful war in Ukraine. At this stage, it is diplomacy, not military escalation, is the true path to European and global security. https://www.other-news.info/the-wests-false-narrative-about-russia-and-china/ *Professor at Columbia University, is Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University and President of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He has served as adviser to three UN Secretaries-General, and currently serves as an SDG Advocate under Secretary-General António Guterres.