Pun Salad

• All respect to Matt Taibbi. Because his memory (and that of the maker of this video) goes back longer than two years:

  We can gripe about "memory holing". And we should. But even Orwell might point out that his fictional hole was far more effective; there were no Taibbis in 1984.

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• The primary purposes of bureaucracy are… In no particular order:

  1. self-promotion;
  2. self-perpetuation;
  3. self-aggrandizement.

  Actually effectuating its stated mission is (at best) secondary. So the following news, relayed by Charles Hilu from the University of Michigan, is totally unsurprising (but also amusing): The DEI Bureaucracy is Failing, Even On Its Own Terms.

  On March 10, 2022, the University of Michigan’s Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion emailed students notifying them of the end of “DEI 1.0” and its intentions to transition to “DEI 2.0,” a new strategic plan set to begin in the fall of 2023. The 2022–2023 school year is an evaluation period for DEI 1.0, so it is not quite set in stone how the new program will look, but the university’s email made it clear that DEI 2.0 will double down on the school’s “commitment to . . . the advancement of anti-racism, anti-ableism, anti-Semitism, gender equity and building a climate resistant to sexual misconduct.” And no, you did not read that third item in the list wrong.

  Several hours later, the administration sent out a follow-up email apologizing for the “harm” caused by the obvious mistake. Although insignificant in and of itself, such errors are the natural product of the incompetent DEI bureaucracy at U-M, which employed 167 staff in 2021 and is the largest office of its kind in the country according to a report from the Heritage Foundation. And according to a recent survey conducted by the university, since the size of the DEI staff began ballooning under President Mark Schlissel (who arrived in 2015 and was fired earlier in the year for an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate), the campus climate has only worsened.

  Yes, they weren't really paying attention to what they were saying.

  Which is a common problem with these folks. Back in 2014, I noted the dreadful rhetoric promoting an "anti-violence" event at the University Near Here. Which, among other things, encouraged UNH denizens to:

  

  As I noted back then, the mindset seems to be: "We don't have to think about what we're saying if our hearts are pure."

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• And shut up those sneaky little Hobbitses. David Harsanyi notes New Zealand's PM Calls For Global Censorship Regime. Noting some disparate coverage:

  Only days after the American left was lamenting the fall of Italy to the alleged fascist Giorgia Meloni, New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern told world leaders assembled at the United Nations that unfettered free expression was one of the greatest threats facing humanity. In her speech, cloaked in the same trendy euphemisms popular among American progressives — and probably familiar to the despots and theocrats in attendance — she warned that the internet had been corrupted and weaponized by bad actors who spread mis- and disinformation and hateful ideologies. And the only way we can stop this “weapon of war” is to come together and create a set of “rules and transparency.”

  As our president might say, no right is absolute. Or, as our former president might say, disinformation is killing people.

  (Hope everyone got the reference in this item's headline.)

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• Kat Rosenfield is a national treasure. She takes a turn of summing up the week's news at Common Sense. (And don't get me started about the plain fact that claims of "common sense" are far more common that actual common sense.) Anyway, here's a slice: TGIF: Lizzo, Coolio and Everyone in Between where she talks about "fascist Giorgia Meloni".

  → Italians Rallyin': Giorgia Meloni, the newly elected prime minister of Italy, went viral this week after her remarks from a 2019 speech at the World Congress of Families in Verona surfaced on Twitter. Not since Roberto Benigni vowed to make passionate Jupiterian love to the entire audience at the 1999 Academy Awards has a speech by an overwrought Italian gotten so much attention from the American chattering class.

  The aforementioned nervousness about Meloni isn't just due to her ability to bring a crowd to its feet; her win in Italy is part of a rising tide of populist sentiment in Europe. There, the years-long migration crisis and pandemic-related economic struggles have combined with anxieties over the war in Ukraine to give right-wing politicians a boost. Sweden, which is experiencing similar issues, just saw a major election win for the far-right Sweden Democrats, which are now the second-largest party in the next parliament.

  For mainstream American commentators, the main point of debate seems to be whether or not Meloni is a fascist. (For much of this crowd, everything and everyone to the right of Bernie Sanders is a fascist.) Here’s what we know: Meloni’s party, the Brothers of Italy, is a sort of nephew-thrice-removed of Italy's original fascist party. But as Yascha Mounk at The Atlantic points out, Meloni has disavowed fascism (“fascism is history,” she has said) and suspended members of the party who praise it. So declaring her the second coming of Mussolini would be, at the very least, premature.

  We have less premature things to worry about, like the speech cop in New Zealand.

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• As previously noted, Her Majesty was a pretty nice girl. Jeff Jacoby is no royal sycophant, nevertheless writing about Elizabeth the good. He notes that "monarchy is, if not inherently disgraceful, then decidedly anachronistic and contrary to the deepest American ideals". He also notes that (nonetheless) there seems to be an inherent human craving for something like it:

  For all that, there is no getting around the fact that even in America, countless people long to be ruled by individuals with the "right" genetic lineage. Until Joe Kennedy III unsuccessfully challenged Ed Markey in the 2020 US Senate race, a majority of Massachusetts voters had for 70 years automatically elected any member of the Kennedy family who appeared on the ballot. As his Senate campaign faltered, Kennedy released a commercial that all but laid claim to the office on the basis of his DNA. "Joe Kennedy knows how a legacy is earned," an announcer declared, as images of Robert, Edward, and John F. Kennedy appeared on the screen. "It's a fight in his blood." That was shameless.

  But he liked QE2. And (among other things) tells this priceless tale:

  In one hilarious vignette, a royal security escort named Richard Griffin recalled the time he was accompanying the queen as she walked her dogs on the grounds of the Balmoral estate and they came across a pair of American tourists at a public picnic site. At such moments, the queen would generally stop and courteously say hello — usually giving the flustered tourists an unexpected thrill — but on that occasion it was clear that the two tourists hadn't recognized her.

  Making small talk, the visitors asked the older woman where she lived. She replied: "Well, I live in London but I've got a holiday home just over the hills. I've been coming up here ever since I was a little girl, over 80 years."

  One tourist asked: "Well, if you've been coming up here for 80 years you must have met the queen?"

  Without missing a beat, the queen replied: "Well, I haven't, but Dick here meets her regularly." When Griffin was asked, "What is she like?" he replied with a twinkle in his eye: "Well, she can be very cantankerous at times but she's got a great sense of humor."

  The tourists asked if they could have their picture taken with Griffin, and asked his companion if she would do the honors. After the queen took a picture of Griffin with the tourists, they swapped places and Griffin took a picture of the tourists with the queen. He said: "We never let on, and we waved goodbye and Her Majesty said, 'I'd love to be a fly on the wall when they show those pictures to their friends in America and hopefully someone tells them who I am.'"

  I don't think we'll see another one like her.

I was beguiled into putting this book on my get-at-library list by the author's appearance on Russ Roberts' EconTalk podcast. OK, that was back in January 2021. I was slow about it.

Because I am the near opposite the author, Matthew B. Crawford. I am a hopeless non-starter when it comes to things mechanical, especially motor vehicles. And I can't remember the last time I drove in order simply to get out of the house, to assuage my wanderlust. Crawford has me beat on both those scores.

But I was wrong in my reluctance and delay: Crawford is a fine writer, with an obvious enthusiasm for his topics, making them accessible and interesting to (I think) just about anyone. So I enjoyed this read quite a bit.

Note that I said "topics" just now. There's a lot of stuff going on here. The "philosophy" promised in the subtitle is here, of course. But there's also some straight reportage, tales of his personal experiences, and some pretty intense gearhead stuff with illustrations of timing gears, piston rods, crankshafts, … Something for everyone! Even the philosophical stuff covers a range of topics: ruminations on self-driving cars, safetyism, absurdly low speed limits, and how "surveillance capitalism" is encroaching on our privacy (specifically, tracking our travels).

The tone varies from chapter to chapter. On page 195, you'll read about a woman at a Virginia dirt bike race haranguing a hesitant young man (her son?), suggesting he "Quit being a fucking vagina!" Only a few paragraphs after that, Nietzsche and Plutarch are called in for their relevant takes.

Gee, I hope that's OK to say at Goodreads.

There is a streak of Hayekianism where the author ruminates on countries where traffic is less regulated. (Busy intersections without traffic lights or stop signs? Sure! Left on red? Why not! Speed limits? Pishtosh!) It turns out that people adopt their own rules in such situations, without (much) detriment to safety or efficiency.

But there's also a strong streak of anti-corporatism in Crawford. Especially the new-fangled tech-driven companies, the Ubers, the Teslas, the Googles. Especially Google. (The Volkswagens, Fords, Hondas, etc. are OK, though.) There's something creepy, he thinks, about the masses of data the tech companies collect, and then sell to (gasp!) advertisers. Who might actually bring your attention to a product or service you might find useful! Heinous!

Still, it's an interesting argument, made well.