Before 1919, Americans didn’t buy things on credit. General Motors changed that. The company realized it couldn’t sell enough cars for cash, so they started lending buyers the dough for a new set of wheels. Sears and other companies followed suit. Then Wall Street decided to get in on the action, “and started offering stock on credit—’on margin,’ it was called. By the thousands, middle‑class Americans opened margin accounts, putting up 10 or 20 percent of a stock purchase and borrowing the rest. When the market went up, the returns felt like free money.” And there’s nothing like free money, until the bill comes due. In those early days of credit, the bill came due in 1929, the greatest crash in American history. Andrew Ross Sorkin started writing his new book 1929 because he was interested in the finances and psychology behind an important moment in the country’s history, not necessarily because of parallels to today’s market. But in the months leading up to the book’s release, things started to feel a little too familiar in all the wrong ways. An adapted excerpt from The Atlantic (Gift Article): The Lesson of 1929. “Problems arise when we get greedy and take too much. Nobody knows for sure where the line is—or what to do when we discover that we’ve gone past it. At that point, panic is the natural reaction.”
+ Back in the 1920s, credit was new. A century later, “everybody’s getting sucked into creating a lifestyle that’s bigger than them, bigger than what they can afford,” as tech-focused Buy Now Pay Later companies have taken credit to a whole new level. What could possibly go wrong? Well, for one thing, Laterdoesn’t mean never. NYT Magazine (Gift Article): They Got to Live a Life of Luxury. Then Came the Fine Print.
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Protein Age Wasteland
There’s always a major trend that drives the food industry and eventually lines the shelves of local of your local market. Today, that trend is high protein. Most people think they need more protein. And the increasing number of folks on GLP-1 drugs are probably right. Hence, protein is everywhere. And I mean everywhere. Protein Is Showing Up in Doritos, Waffles and Now Even Pop-Tarts.
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Free Radicals
The remarkable hope for a “historic dawn of a new Middle East” represented by yesterday’s hostage release, prisoner exchange, and ceasefire deal has almost immediately run into some harsh realities on the ground in Gaza. For one thing, though dramatically weakened, Hamas is still Hamas. “On Monday, a video circulating on social media appears to show several masked gunmen, some of them wearing green headbands resembling ones worn by Hamas, shooting with machine guns at least seven men after forcing them to kneel in the street. Posts identify the video as filmed in Gaza on Monday. Civilian spectators cheer ‘Allah Akbar,’ or God is Great, and call those killed ‘collaborators.’” Hamas said to kill over 30 Gazans as terror group moves to reassert its grip on Strip.
+ Reuters: Gaza ceasefire outlook darkens as Israel delays aid and Hamas tightens grip. “Israel delayed aid into Gaza and kept the enclave’s border shut on Tuesday, while re-emergent Hamas fighters demonstrated their grip by executing men in the street, darkening the outlook for U.S. President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war.”
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Beacon Bits
“American culture is no longer synonymous with the aspiration to freedom, but with transactionalism and secrecy: the algorithms that mysteriously determine what you see, the money collected by anonymous billionaires, the deals that the American president is making with world leaders that benefit himself and maybe others whose names we don’t know. America was always associated with capitalism, business, and markets, but nowadays there’s no pretense that anyone else will be invited to share the wealth.” Anne Applebaum in The Atlantic (Gift Article): The Beacon of Democracy Goes Dark. “The image of the ugly American always competed with the image of the generous American. Now that the latter has disappeared, the only Americans anyone can see are the ones trying to rip you off.”
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Extra, Extra
Trending Neg on Heg Reg: “The Pentagon is telling beat reporters to sign restrictive new rules by Tuesday or surrender their press passes by Wednesday. Virtually every news outlet is rejecting the ultimatum and saying they will not sign.” (And that includes MAGA news outlets.)
+ Signs of the Times: “No, Coachella’s lineup dropping months earlier than its usual release isn’t actually an indicator of an impending recession. But in the absence of official government data, social media users are casting about for hints — even music festival-related ones — about the true state of the American economy.” WaPo (Gift Article): Recession warning signs to watch: Goodbye lipstick, hello Hamburger Helper.
+ What About Us? “There are a lot of people in this country — most of the 75 million who voted for Kamala Harris last year and a whole lot of others — who are disgusted, appalled and frightened by the first nine months of Trump’s second administration. By the way he’s turned the Justice Department into his vendetta machine, by ICE’s vicious treatment of immigrants and journalists, by his damaging and whimsical decisions about tariffs and much more. But do we hear much about those regular citizens who disagree? I read and watch and listen widely, and I sure don’t. Not in mainstream media, at any rate.” Margaret Sullivan: The media is largely ignoring the trauma of millions. Here’s why.
+ Handing Allies To Enemies: “Now, in the light, he worries it’s not a dream but a vision of his future in Afghanistan, where he will be tortured and killed, where his wife will starve, where his son will be forced to join the militants, where his daughter will become an old man’s fourth wife.” The U.S. saved him from the Taliban, but now it wants to send him back.
+ The Next Fake Emergency: “Even as President Donald Trump and even local magnate Marc Benioff have called on federal troops to quell disorder in the city, San Francisco is on track to have the lowest number of homicides in more than 70 years.” (Why let a little reality get between your lips and the president’s ass?)
+ Jones Beached: Supreme Court rejects Alex Jones’ appeal of $1.4 billion defamation judgment in Sandy Hook shooting. (Even this SCOTUS has a line...)
+ Shooting Stars: “At the questionable corner of sports entertainment and male fertility is Sperm Racing, a startup that recently closed a $10m seed round.” The teen founder turning male fertility into a sport.
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Bottom of the News
“Now teachers avoid breaking kids into groups of six or seven, or asking them to turn to page 67, or instructing them to take six or seven minutes for a task. Six is a perfect number, and seven is a prime number, but only a glutton for punishment would put them together in front of a bunch of 13-year-olds.” WSJ (Gift Article) on the numbers meme that means absolutely nothing. The Numbers Six and Seven Are Making Life Hell for Math Teachers. (I always figured 67 was for people who don’t still have enough flexibility for 69.)