by John Walters
Fields Of Gold
Joe Pompliano, who is one of the better Twitter follows out there (“For he’s a jolly good follow...”), asked his followers to submit their “most beautiful sports venues in the world” last week. The results are magical. That’s Henningsvaer Stadium in Norway above.
Hitzfield Stadium, Switzerland
Jock Itch? No, Jokic
Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic, who was selected 41st in 2014 while a Taco Bell commercial aired on ESPN, was named NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) yesterday. Jokic, 6’11” and from Serbia, becomes the fifth foreign-born player this century to be named league MVP. A superb passer as well as owner of the softest shot in the NBA, Jokic averaged 26, 10 and 8 this season.
Personally, we had Steph Curry as our MVP, which means we must be xenophobic but not racist. Right?
Magnet School
In Ohio, a woman testifies in the state legislature that being vaccinated causes one to be magnetized, and that forks and car keys will this be stuck to your forehead. Why they wouldn’t be stuck to your fingers is a question apparently no one asked. Is there a scintilla of evidence of this? No. But if you’ve been paying attention, you know evidence no longer matters to the GOP.
Chipotle Off The Old Block
Chipotle, which had revenue of $6.1 billion in 2020 and a net profit o $355 million, announced today that it will be raising prices 4% to cover the cost of increasing labor costs. Never mind that the company’s share price is up 400% since 2018. The lesson here is clear: stock price is sacrosanct.
Obviously, Chipotle could easily cover the cost of the increase in labor costs (i.e. higher salaries) within its net profit output, but that would potentially damage the share price. And in this era of capitalism, nothing is allowed to harm the share price. So Chipotle passes that cost on to consumers as if to say, “Nothing we can do about it.”
Two days ago on CNBC Jim Cramer, who has made roughly $100 million in the stock market, was lamenting that he could not find a bartender at his Brooklyn-based Mexican restaurant, Bar San Miguel. Co-host David Faber pushed him on this, asking him if he’s willing to offer a better wage to a potential bartender. Said Cramer, “That’s negotiable.”
I can’t say it enough: the naked greed of the uber-wealthy is head-spinning. Cramer claims he was helping out at his restaurant last night because they’re understaffed. So a dude who could easily afford to double everyone’s wage and not miss a dime at a tiny hole-in-the-wall bistro (I’ve been there; it is tiny) would rather give up his nights to work there than to pay his employees more. I’ve worked at a number of restaurants and I’ve always thought the same thing: If I owned a restaurant, I’d have the smallest staff possible of the best employees possible and then I’d pay them way more than they could make anywhere else. Quality employees who are happy at a restaurant makes all the difference in service. I imagine it works this way at other companies, too.
But employers never practice this approach. They’re too addicted to profits. And yes, the idea of a business is to make money, but at what cost to the quality of the product?
The Kid
…won with Brazil so he’s now back to .667 at 14-7 and above water at $1,120.
He’s taking the Islanders at home tonight versus the Bruins (we disapprove when Gerrit Cole and the Yankees at Minnesota are there for the plucking.
He’s got them at +115 so if he wins, $115, if he loses, $100 down.
A few things about Magnet Mary in Tennessee:
1. Re the spoons and forks, she says “I’m sure you’ve seen the pictures all over the Internet,” speaking with great confidence that the people in the room know exactly what she’s talking about and, more importantly, share her concerns. Of course, if you are in a particular on-line bubble, and see the same ideas repeated over and over, they feel mainstream to you regardless of how deranged they are.
2. This woman is articulate, and seems to have a rapt audience. If you listened to only her, you might think that her ideas are at least worth hearing out, especially if you know little about vaccines or what “5G” even means (which is most of us). And the fervor in her speaking gives her credence. All of this adds to the danger of her words. As Louis Brandeis said, “The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.” This was discussed this week in the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/06/08/loose-knit-conspiracy-theories-are-not-good-substitute-informed-citizenship/?outputType=amp
2. As to the link with 5G towers, she uses terms like “yet to be defined” and “not proven yet,” which is a go-to tactic for conspiracy theorists because then they can never be proven wrong. It permits you to voice the craziest of ideas, as long as you couch them with “I’m not saying this is true for sure; I’m just asking questions.”
This hearing apparently got nuttier: https://twitter.com/tylerjoelb/status/1402646586379878409?s=21
As I watched this woman speak in the Ohio state legislature hearing, I watched the onlookers in the background. I’m shocked that there’s nobody in that crowd that make a face like, “This woman is from crazy town.” Just placid faces, with a couple of people nodding along. Am I taking crazy pills?!
Also – having lived in Colorado, I came across several really cool high school football fields that I would have loved to have played on, given their scenic locals. I went to a nice, private Catholic boys school in St. Louis, with a pretty nice field of its own, but would have traded it out for some of those sweet fields.