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Vaccines
and the limits
of persuasion
Ezra Klein
OPINION
I hate that I believe the sente nce I'm
about to write. It under mines much of
what I spend my life try ing to do. But
there is nothing more over rated in
politics - a nd perhaps in life - than
the power of pers uasion.
It is nearly impossible to convince
people of w hat they don't want to
believe. Decades of work in psychology
attest to this truth, as does most every-
thing in our politics and most of our
ever yday experience. Think of your
own conversations with your family or
your colleagues. How often have you
really persuaded someone to abandon
a st rongly held belief
To reach he rd or preference? Per-
suasion is by no
immunity,
means impossible or
the U.S. - unimporta nt, but on
a nd the world electric topics, it is a
- a re goin g marginal phenom-
to need enon.
a different Which brings me
approach. to the difficult c hoice
we face on coronavi-
rus vaccinations .
The conventional
wisdom is that the re is some argu-
ment, yet unmade and perhaps undis-
covered, tha t will cha nge the minds of
the roughly 30 pe rcent of American
adults who haven't gotten at least one
dose. There probably is n't. The unvac-
cinated often hold their views strongly,
a nd ma ny a re ma king cons idered,
cost-benefit calculations given how
they weigh the ris ks of the v irus, a nd
the information sources they trust to
inform the m of those risks. For all the
exhorta tions to respect their concerns,
there is a dee p condescens ion in be-
lieving tha t we're sma rt e nough to
discover or invent some appeal they
haven't yet heard.
If policymakers want to change their
minds, they have to cha nge their calcu-
lations by raising the costs of remain-
ing unvaccinated, the benefi ts of get-
ting vaccinated, or both . If they can't
do tha t, or won't, the vaccina tion effort
will most likely re main stuck - a t least
until a varia nt wreaks s ufficient car-
nage to change the calculus .
You can see the weakness of persua-
s ion in the ee rie stability of vaccination
prefe re nces. The Kaiser Family Foun-
dation has been s urveying Ame ricans
a bout their vaccination inte ntions
s ince December. At tha t time, 15 per-
cent said they would "definitely"
KLEIN, PAGE JO
The New York Times publishes opinion
from a wide range of perspectives in
hopes of promoting constructive debate
about consequential questions.
They flock to buy comics at France's expense
PARIS ~~, ,)~-
A cultural app designed
for teenagers to indulge
their interests has its critics
BY AURELI EN BREEDEN
When the Frenc h government intro-
duced a sma rtphone a pp tha t gives 300
e uros to every 18-year-old in the country
for cultural purchases like books a nd
music, or exhibition a nd pe rformance
tickets, mos t young people 's impulse
wasn't to buy Proust's g reatest works or
to line up a nd see Molie re.
Instead, France's teenagers flocked to
manga.
"It's a really good initiative," said Ju-
liette Sega, who lives in a s mall town in
southeastern France a nd has used €40
(about $47) to buy Japanese comic
books a nd "The Maze Runne r," a dysto-
pian novel.
"I ' 111 a s teady consumer of novels a nd
NEWSSTAND PRICES
The European Solidarity Cente r, left, on the grounds of the former shipyards in Gdansk, Poland, and a monument to workers killed during Poland's revolt against Communism.
A syn1bol of unity fractures
GDANSK, POLAND
The Solidarity movement
fought for a new Poland.
Now it's a sign of division.
BY ANDREW HIGGINS
Solida rity, the independe nt Polish trade
union that four decades ago s ta rted a n
avala nche of dissent that swept away
Communism, has more m odest a mbi-
tions these days. For a s ta rt, it wants its
plywood boards back.
The boards, scrawled with dem ands
for freedom a nd hoisted on a wall a t the
Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk in 1980, have
been on display s ince 2014 a t a museum
built a mid the ruins of a facility tha t laid
off mos t of its workers years ago.
The museum, a n oasis of shimme ring
modernity constructed with European
Union funds, is dedicated to the ideals
that drove Solidarity in 1980 when it was
a diverse, Western-looking oppos ition
moveme nt with 10 million me mbe rs .
Today, that movement has shriveled
to a na rrow and deeply conservative
force, but one that, whil e fie rcely op-
posed to Communism, boasts of speak-
ing up for those left behind by Poland's
often painful tra ns ition to capitalis m.
0
L'Emile bookstore in Paris. J apanese comic books make up about two-thirds of book sales
through Culture Pass, an app that gives young users $350 to buy tickets, goods or books.
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A FLOATING LIFE
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PAGE 3 I WORLD
INTERNATIONAL EDITION I FRIDAY, JULY 30, 2021
Lech Walesa, founder of the Polish trade union Solidarity. In 1980 it was a huge
opposition movement ; now, it is aligned with the nationalist governing party.
That shift has put the plywood boards, eastern flank, whe re soaring hopes gen-
refe rred to with almost religious rever- erated by the end of Communis m and
ence as "the tablets," a t the center of a the prospect of rejoining the rest of Eu-
bitter tussle over Poland's past a nd fu- rope have often curdled into surly, in-
ture. ward-looking disconte nt.
Instead of the symbol of unity it once No longer in oppos ition, the union is
was, Solidarity has become a n emble m now closely aligned with Poland's intol-
of the divis ions that now define politics erant nationalist governing pa rty, Law
across Europe's formerly Communist a nd Justice.
ma nga, a nd it helps pay for them."
As of this month, books represented
over 75 percent of all purchases mad e
through the a pp since it was introduced
nationwide in May - a nd roughly two-
thirds of those books we re manga, ac-
cording to the organization that runs the
a pp, called the Culture Pass.
T he Fre nch ne ws media has writte n of
a "ma nga rush," fueled by a " ma nga
pass" - obser vations that came via a
slightly distorted lens, since the a pp ar-
rived just as theaters, cinemas and mu-
sic festivals, eme rging from pandemic-
rela ted restrictions, had less to offe r.
And ma nga were already wildly popula r
in Fra nce.
But the focus on comic books reveals
a s ubtle te nsion a t the heart of the Cul-
ture Pass's design, be tween the almost
total freedom it affords it young users -
including to buy the mass media they al-
ready love - and its a rchitects' aim of
guiding users towa rd lesser-known and
more highbrow a rts.
ANDRIA MANTOVANl FOR THE NEW YORK TMES Eve ry Fre nch 18-year-old can acti-
vate the pass a nd spe nd €300, about
FRANCE, PAGE 2
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OLYMPIC ANTICIPATION
GRUELING WAIT, FOLLOWED
BY A DEFINING MOMENT
PAGE 13 I SPORTS
PHOTOGRAPHS BY MAClEK NABRDAUK FOR lllE N[W YORK TIMES
"Solidarity back then and Solida rity
today rep resent two differe nt vis ions of
Pola nd," said Adam Michnik, a n intellec-
tual who rallied to the side of Gda ns k's
s triking workers in the 1980s. Today's
Solidarity, he said, was a "very small
caricature" of the trade union he once
s upporte d.
Instead of cha mpioning freedoms,
Solida rity today lobbies actively on the
g overnment's s ide against gay me n, les-
bia ns a nd anyone else it views as insuffi-
cie ntly respectful of the Polish nation
a nd its traditional values.
Refra ming the old fi ght against Com-
munis m as a struggle today against ho-
mosexua lity, a cove r a rticle last yea r in
Solidarity's weekly journal asked: "Is
L.G.B.T. a new nee-Ma rxist ideology?"
It featured a n image of the Sovie t ha m-
me r a nd s ickle imposed on a rainbow
flag.
For today's Solidarity, s natching back
the table ts from the governing party's
liberal en emies isa vital pa rt of a conser-
vative campaign to reclaim a nd reshape
the past in ways that justify Pola nd's
c urrent d irection.
" It is just a ma tter of time before we
get the m back," said Roman Kuzminski,
a former shipyard worker w ho is now a
Solida rity leader in Gdansk a nd a loyal
Law a nd Justice voter.
He de nied that his union, once a pow-
POLAND, PAGE 4
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ffJ
Tunisia beat
extremism,
but it can't
prod growth
GAZIANTEP, TURKEY
Transition to democracy
stumbles without full
support from the West
BY CARLOTTA GALL
In the 10 years s ince its popular uprising
set off the Arab Spring, Tunis ia has often
been praised as the one success story to
e merge from that era of turbulence. It
rejected extre mis m a nd open warfare, it
averted a counterrevolution a nd its civic
leaders were awarded a Nobel Peace
P r ize for consens us building .
Yet fo r all the praise, Tunisia, a s mall
North African country of 11 million,
never fixed the serious economic prob-
le ms that led to the upr ising in the first
place.
It also never received the full-
throated support of Western backers,
something that might have helped it
make a real trans ition from the inequity
of dictatorship to prosperous democra-
cy, a nalysts and activists say. Instead, at
cr itical points in Tunis ia's effo rts to re-
make itself, ma ny of its needs were over-
looked by the West, for w hich the fight
agains t Isla mist ter rorism overs had-
owed all other priorities.
Now, as Tunisians grapple with their
la test upheaval, which began when
Preside nt Kais Saied dismissed the
prime minister and suspended Parlia-
me nt last weekend, many seem divided
on whethe r to condemn his ac tions - or
e mbrace the m.
Political pa rties a re split over the le-
gality of his executive takeover, while
activists and human rights organiza-
tions, determined to preserve Tunisia's
sovereignty a nd keep the goals of the
20 II re volution alive, called for the out-
s ide world to keep watching a nd moni-
toring.
Yet the fact that Tunisia ns a re so e xas-
pe ra ted with their leade rs a mid a deep
economic cris is a nd disastrous wave of
Covid-19 infections that some a re cheer-
ing a highhanded move is a s ign of how
bad things have become.
"We had tre me ndous prog ress on the
freedom front a nd the political fron t de-
spite all the crises;' said Fadhel Kaboub,
a n associate professor of economics at
Denison University in Ohio. " But what
you have kept almost intact is the exact
same economic development model that
produced inequality, that produced the
debt crisis, that produced the s ocial eco-
nomic exclusion, that the population re--
belled against."
Mr. Ka boub is among a growing num-
be r of Tunis ia ns questioning the much-
tried Weste rn playbook for countries
tra nsitioning from a uthoritar ianis m to
de mocracy. T hat approach, they say, has
produced oligarchies and counterrevo-
lutions . And in eme rging ma rkets it has
led to a burst of economic progress fol-
lowed by a re turn to weakness.
TUNISIA, PAGE 4
J
PAGE TWO
Cuba sends a chilling message
Hundreds are detained
following protests that
called for economic reform
BY ERNESTO LONDONO
AND DANIEL POLITI
T he courage many Cubans showed
when they poured into the streets two
weeks ago - chanting "Down with the
dictatorship!" and "We are not afraid !"
- has curdled into fear for many.
Hundreds have been detained, advo-
cates say, and an untold number are still
being held. The police have staked out
the homes of activists . And a mong gov-
ernment critics, the re is a widespread
sense that the crackdown is far from
over.
Maykel Gonzalez, an independent
journalist taken into custody after the
July 11 protests, has ventured out of his
home rarely in recent days, frightened
by the surveillance a nd harassment that
other protesters are e nduring.
"At any mom ent they could show up at
my door," said Mr. Gonzalez, 37. " It's a
fear that's with me from the moment I
wake up."
When Cubans, spurred by a severe
economic crisis, erupted in a rare wave
of public rallies, government critics on
the island and abroad hoped the act of
defiance would force the isla nd's au-
thoritarian rulers to e mbrace political
a nd economic reforms.
Instead, the response by the authori-
ties has been draconian. State-run me-
dia outlets denounce demonstrators as
vandals and looters. Police officers have
gone door-to-door making detentions,
human rights activists and proteste rs
said.
An estimated 700 people are being
held by the governme nt, according to
human rights organizations. In some
cases, their families went days without
knowing where their loved ones were
being held, or what their legal status
was. In others, protesters have been
convicted in quick trials that don't re-
quire the presence of a defense lawyer,
according to human rights activists.
The crackdown has paralyzed, at
least for now, the rebellious spirit tha t
took hold on the island for a few hours on
July 11, a Sunday, as thousands of Cu-
bans chanted, "Freedom!"
And fear is the prevailing feeling
among ma ny of those who protested.
"There's a ferocious campaign to
paint all of them as delinquents," said
Elaine Diaz, the founder of Periodismo
de Barr io, an inde pendent news outle t
that has published videos and podcas ts
with firsthand accounts from de tained
protesters. "We went from a state of fea r
to a state of terror."
In interviews, people who protested
a nd their relatives described panicky
conversations inside homes a nd among
neighbors about what shape the crack-
down may ta ke in coming days. Cuba ns
e mployed by the state fre tted about
their job security. Those with de tained
relatives expressed fear that speaking
out would lead to harsher treatment for
their loved ones.
"This practice of detentions has the
effect of ma king a n example out of peo-
ple," said Laritza Diversent, the director
of Cubalex, a huma n rights orga nization
begun in Cuba but now based in the
United States that provides legal aid to
disside nts. "The rest of society becomes
inhibited from pa rticipating in new
demonstrations."
The Cuban a uthorities were caught
off guard by the scope and size of the
July 11 de monstra tions. Preside nt Mi-
guel Diaz-Canel called on government
supporters to take back the streets, ex-
plicitly issuing "a call to combat."
The following day, the president
struck a more conciliatory tone, ac-
knowledging the privation and distress
many Cuba n families a re e xperie ncing.
The protests were fueled by a n eco-
nomic crisis that worsened whe n the
pande mic shut down tourism, leaving
many Cuba ns une mployed a nd hungry.
Cuban government officials say that
A scholar of Myanmar, he counseled its opposition
JOSEF SILVERSTEIN
1922- 2021
BY SETH MYDANS
J osef Silverstein, a schola r a nd outspo-
ke n critic of Myanmar's re pressive mili-
tary leaders ove r a turbule nt half-cen-
tury, died on June 29 a t his home in Guil-
ford, Conn. He was 99.
His son, Fra nk, said the cause was
complications of dementia. His wife,
Marilyn (Cooper ) Silverstein, who was
also his editor a nd colla borator, died
eight days earlie r.
Professor Silve rstein, w ho taught in-
te rna tional relations and Southeast
Asian studies a t Rutgers University in
New J ersey, focused on de mocracy and
huma n rights in Myanmar both as a n ac-
ademic expert a nd as an on-the-ground
adviser to oppos ition g roups .
Because of his c riticism of the military
leade rs hip, he was denied entry to
Myanmar for most of his career. As a re-
sult he freq ue ntly me t with rebel leade rs
along the borde rs with Thaila nd and
China, advising them on the concepts of
federalism a nd constitutional law.
Professor Silverstein "was no run-of-
the-mill Western expert or acade mic,"
Maung Zarni, a Burmese educator, aca-
Top, a demonstrator being detained during a protest in Havana on July 11. Economic hardship has increased after a drop in tourism.
Above, Cuban special forces in Havana. The police have staked out the homes of activists and detained an estimated 700 people.
all investigations and dete ntions stem-
ming from the July llprotests have been
conducted lawfully.
"In Cuba there a re n't secret prisons,"
Col. Victor Alvarez Valle, a senior offi-
cial at the Ministry of Interior, said in an
interv iew broadcast on a sta te-run tele-
vision channel. He said Cubans who
were detained in the wa ke of the demon-
strations have been allowed to commu-
nicate with loved ones a nd will have ac-
cess to defe nse lawyers.
Many are terrified after a
remarkable act of defiance.
But the thrust of the state's response
has been punitive, human rights activ-
ists said.
Ms. Diversent said that as of Monday,
he r group a nd others had tallied 699
credible reports of detentions rela ted to
the July 11 protests - and tha t is an in-
comple te accounting of the judicial fall-
out.
Several families said the lack of infor-
ma tion about the location a nd legal sta-
tus of their relatives has left them an-
guished.
Alberto Turis Betancourt, 43, said he
and his siste r Dailin Eugenia Beta n-
court sponta neously joined the throngs
demic and huma n rights activist, wrote
in an a ppreciation publis hed online this
month. Ra ther, he said, the professor
was part of a breed of interna tional
schola rs who "chose to forego access to
the countries a nd peoples they studied
- and cared about - as they e ndured
unde r murderous milita ry dictator-
ships."
After a coup in 1962, whe n the mili-
tar y, led by Gen. Ne Win , replaced the
civilian government, Myanmar, the n
know n as Bur ma, shut itself off from the
outside world to purs ue what Ne Win
called a "Burmese way to socialism."
Many, including Professor Silverstein,
found the policy to be economically dis-
astrous .
"Josef Silverstein was one of the few
Weste rn acade mics who really knew
and spoke out about what was going on
in Myanmar a nd the te rrible toll the mil-
ita ry continued to inflict," Phil Rob-
ertson, the deputy director of the Asia
division of Human Rights Watch, w rote
in an e mail. "For that, he e arned admir-
e rs a mong the Burmese people a nd
their advocates a round th e world, and
the deep hatred of the country's milita ry
dictators."
His in sights helped keep many jour-
nalists on track through the twists a nd
turns of Myanma r 's turmoil, including
of proteste rs that streamed down the di-
lapidated streets of old Havana that
Sunday cha nting antigovernme nt slo-
gans.
Mr. Betancourt said he ducked into a
house following a scuffle with pro-gov-
ernme nt demonstrators who spat on
him.
When the streets calmed down, he re-
alized that his sister, who is 44, was
missing. It took six days for the family to
learn that Ms . Betancourt was in cus-
tody, charged with disorderly conduct.
"My siste r doesn't belong to any oppo-
sition group and has no criminal his-
tory," Mr. Betancourt said. "She's jus t a n
ordinary Cuban."
In recent days, Mr. Beta ncourt has
wrestled with the risk of speaking pub-
licly about his family's plight. His wife
works as a nurse and wor ries it could
jeopardize her job, he said; she has also
admonished him for sha ring informa-
tion about the case on Facebook. Even
neighbors have urged him to lay low and
keep quiet.
"But it's my sister, wha t a m I sup-
posed to do?" Mr. Beta ncourt said in a
phone interview. "They've locked he r up
a nd I'm taking care of he r two kids."
In the immedia te afterma th of the
July 11 protests, seasoned opposition
leade rs who have spent years in the
cross hair s of Cuba's police apparatus
Josef Silverstein in Myanmar in 1990, when he was invited by opposition leaders. A
critic of the country's repressive regime, he was denied entry for most of his career.
the military massacres of proteste rs in
1988 a nd the more recent sla ughter of
Rohin gya Muslims.
"Whe n we, at The Associated Press,
we re pressed for some intelligent, in-
sightful comment on de velopme nts in
Burma, someone in our bureau would
ELIANAAPONTI:IASSIXlAlIDl'Rf.SS
said they hoped that fear had lost its
long, tig ht grip on the isla nd.
Among those detained were two
Evangelical pastors from Ma tanzas, a
port city east of Havana. J atniel Perez, a
fellow pastor, called their detention be-
wildering a nd alarming. "They a ren't
trouble-prone;' Mr. Perez said.
Mr. Gonzalez, the journalist, is still
processing the events of J uly 11. After
the gover nme nt shut dow n access to the
internet across much of the island that
day, he hit the streets, inte nding to docu-
me nt what was ha ppening for his news
outlet, Tremenda Nata.
" But once there, I let myself get pulled
in by that s nowball rolling downhill and
I joined the de monstration like any
other protester," he said.
Whe n the group he was with ap-
proached Revolution P laza, an iconic,
heavily policed site in the capital, uni-
formed officers placed him in handcuffs,
he said.
As he was being dragged to a vehicle,
a n officer pulled him by the hair, which
caused his eyeglasses to hit the floor. Mr.
Gonzalez, who is nea rsig hted, pleaded
with the officers to let him pick them up.
Instead, an officer kicked the glasses
away.
"There's only one way to read that,"
he said. "Their intent was to punish, to
do harm."
VIASILVERSJ'E.IN rAMlLY
say, ' Le t's contact Josef,'" De nis Gray,
the news agency's longtime Ba ngkok
bureau chief, wrote in a n email. "And he
always came throug h."
On Fe b. 1, a milita ry coup e nded a pe-
riod of quasi-de mocracy in Myanma r
that began in 2011, when parlia mentary
Flocking to buy comics
as France pays the bill
FRANCE, FROM PAGE I
$350, for up to two years on the app, on
which ove r 8,000 businesses a nd insritu-
tions have listed their offe rings.
Teenagers can buy physical goods
from bookstores, record shops and a rts
supply or instrument stores. T hey can
purchase tickets to movie showings ,
plays, concerts or museum e xhibitions .
And they can sign up for dance, painting
or drawing classes.
Noel Corbin, a Culture Ministry offi-
cial who oversees the project, said the
pass gave France's newly minted adults
a way of looking up nearby cultural of-
ferings - the app has a geolocation fea-
ture - and e ncouraged them to indulge
their cultural passions.
But it also uses incentives to push
teenagers toward new, more challe ng-
ing art fo rms, he said, a type of curation
to "bring young people to discover the
realms of possibility of cultural life."
Those include recommendation lists
curated b y Culture Pass staff members
a nd by popular a rtists and celebrities,
as well as access to VI.P. events, like a
live-streamed concert at the Soulages
Museum in southern France and a be-
hind-the-scenes look at the Avignon the-
ater festival.
In a speech to introduce the Culture
Pass in May, President Emma nuel Ma-
cron, who had made the initiative one of
his campaign promises, said that France
would m ark a "formidable victory"
when young people stop saying, "This
wor k of literature, this movie is not for
me."
Yet critics argue that letting 825,000
teenagers loose with free cash and ex-
pecting the m to be nudged away from
the nearest m ultiple x and into an art-
house movie theate r is a na"ive waste of
taxpayer money.
Jean-Michel Tobele m, a n associate
professor at the University Paris l Pan-
theon-Sorbonne who specializes in the
economics of culture, said that it was a
laudable effort but that it would la rgely
benefit the mainstream media.
"You don't need to push young people
to go see the latest Marvel movie," he
said. The re is nothing wrong with pop
music or blockbusters, he stressed, ac-
knowledging tha t "you can e nter Kore-
a n culture through K-pop and the n dis-
cover that the re is a whole cinema, a lit-
erature, painters a nd composer s that go
with it."
But Tobele m said tha t he was uncon-
vinced that the no-strings-attached ap-
proach of the Culture Pass would do
that, a nd that the app gave few incen-
tives to e ngage with ''works tha t are
more demanding on an a rtistic level."
The app comes with built-in restr ic-
tions: User s can spe nd only up to €100
on offerings like e-books a nd online me-
dia s ubscriptions, a nd on music or mov-
ie stream ing services, which a re also
limited to Fre nch companies. And while
the Culture Pass can be spent on video
games, the game's publisher must be
Fre nch , a nd the game must not feature
violence - conditions so restrictive that
most popular titles a re unavailable.
Naza Chiffe rt, who runs two inde-
pendent bookstores in Paris, said the
Culture Pass had already had a positive
impact on her business. "Getting young
people who read but who are more used
to Amazon or big-box stores to come to
us isn't easy," she said, but now s he has
teenagers in her stores every day.
Still, some worry that the pass will be
a financial windfall for people from priv-
ileged backgrounds while doing little to
help othe rs expa nd their cultural hori-
zons.
"A kid from the projects will lean to-
ward what he already knows," said
Pierre Ouzoulias, a senator for the
French Communist Party who has
pushed to scrap the pass. "I can't for one
mome nt imagine a kid using the pass to
go liste n to Ba roque opera."
Ouzoulias fell in love with Baroque
ope ra as a teenager, despite growing up
in a "relatively modest environment,
with almost no musical c ulture." But he
elections and other reforms were intro-
duced. And the military's bloody crack-
down on pro-democracy proteste rs has
continued .
" I know how devastated he would be
knowing of the events which have ta ken
place since Feb. l ," Mr. Gray said of Pro-
fessor Silverstein. "He was always look-
ing forward to the day of real democracy
for Burma."
In March 2013, after the pro-democra-
cy leade r Daw Aung San Suu Kyi was re-
leased from two decades of house a rrest,
Professor Silverstein was prescie nt in
warning about the political compro-
mises she might make.
"To the outside world, nothing has re-
ally cha nged with her ; she is Suu Kyi
a nd all the beautiful things that go with
it," he told The New Yor k Times . "She is
essentially ma king he rself ir relevant.
We have not heard Suu Kyi talk as Suu
Kyi."
Since the n Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi has
disappointed her supporte rs a broad,
particula rly by failing to speak out
against the milita ry massacres of the
Rohingya minority.
Josef Silverstein was born in Los An-
geles on May 15, 1922, to Frank a nd
Be tty (Heyma nson) Silve rstein.
Professor Silver stein spent much of
World War II a nd the Korean War at sea
said he was a n exception to the rule, and
favors more structured support from
the state. " II you leave individuals to
their own devices, you perpetuate social
discrimination," he said.
One large union representing hun-
dreds of public cultural institutions,
mainly in the performing a rts, called the
pass a "preside ntial gadget" with "exor-
bitant" funding. The project cost €80
million (nearly $95 million) this year,
a nd that is expected to double next year,
although it will re main a fraction of the
Culture Ministry's nearly €4 billion
budget.
Opponents accuse Macron of throw-
ing cash at young people to court their
vote before next year's presidential
election and choosing a n unregulated
a pproach instead of fund ing existing
cash-strapped outreach programs, like
those run by youth community centers,
that broaden access to culture in a more
structured way.
~
PHOTOCRAPI-IS BY ANDREA MANT'OVANI f'OR nlE NEW YORK TIMES
Top, manga at L'Emile bookstore. Above,
teenagers can also purchase items from
record shops with their Culture Pass app.
France's Culture Ministry counters
tha t it plans to introduce the pass to mid-
dle-school students, first in a teacher-
ma naged classroom setting, a nd gradu-
ally increasing amounts of a utonomy
a nd money, until students reach 18. It
also says the pass e nables cultural insti-
tutions to reach young a udiences, which
a re usually ha rd to attract, directly on
their smartphones. Tee nagers them-
selves echoed both critics a nd promot-
ers of the pass: More guidance wouldn't
hurt, but the freedom is great.
Gabriel Tine, a n 18-year-old osteo-
pathy stude nt in Paris, has spent over
€200 from his pass a t Citeaux Sphe re, a
Parisia n record store, where he a nd a
frie nd were thumbing through vinyls on
a recent afte rnoon.
Nearly all of his friends have activat-
ed the pass, a nd na tionwide nearly
630,000 teenagers now use it.
"I wouldn't say no to a ttending a jazz
concert or some thing like tha t," Tine
said, although he added tha t the app
hadn't e nticed him to buy those tickets.
"What's interesting,1' he said, "is that
each per son can do wha t they want with
it."
with the merchant marine, signin g on
after Pea r l Ha rbor a nd serving in the At-
lantic, Pacific and Middle East war
zones.
In 1952, he earned a bachelor 's degree
a t the University of California a t Los An-
geles. He went on to pursue a Ph.D. in
political science in the Southeast Asia
studies program at Cornell University.
His introduction to the country that
would cons ume his life came in 1955,
whe n he received a Fulbright Schol-
a rship to travel to Ra ngoon, the n the
capital (now Yangon), a nd comple te his
research for his doctorate, which he re-
ceived with honors in 1960.
His first academic appointment was
to Wesleyan Univer sity in Connecticut,
where he taught political scie nce from
1958 to 1964. He the n moved to Rutgers,
where he was on the faculty until he re-
tired and became a professor eme ritus
in 1992.
He took leaves of absence to be a Ful-
bright lecturer at Mandalay Univer sity
in Burma in 1961a nd at the University of
Malaya in Malaysia in 1967. In 1970, he
took a two-yea r leave to serve as direc-
tor of the Institute of Southeast Asian
Studies in Singapore.
In addition to his son, Professor Sil-
verstein is survived by another son,
Gordon , and a grandda ughte r.
World
Canal boats on the Grand Union Canal near Daventry, England. Many of Britain's canals were previously in disrepair, but have been painstakingly restored starting in the 1960s.
Messing about in boats
ENGLAND DISPATCH
LITTLE BOURTON, ENG LAND
More people in Britain
are embracing the delights
of slow living on canals
BY MEGAN SPECIA
On a damp June afternoon, a floating
home bobbed gently on the Oxford Ca-
nal, where it was moored just outside
the v illage of Little Bourton, a blip on the
map with just one pub.
Rachel Bruce and her husband, Chris
Hall, have called this idyllic spot north-
west of London home for a few days,
looking out from the hull of the ir canal
boat, the Glenrich V, over sweeping
fields whe re the wind blowing throug h
the long grass made a low hiss.
But it was time to discover their next
patch. So the mooring pins were freed,
a nd Ms. Bruce, 31, steered away from
the bank. Their boat set off at the pace of
a swift walk as it passed through the
hulking woode n a nd steel gates of the
canal's locks .
A group of five ducklings skimmed
the water in a V-shape. Kayakers hur-
ried along, quickly bypassing their boat.
The vivid yellow of butte rcups peeked
through the high grass on the towpath.
"We're just feeling like we've made a
very good life decision at the moment,"
Ms. Bruce said a bout the couple's choice
a few weeks ago to give up their station-
a ry lives to begin a slow traverse of Eng-
la nd's canal network.
A vast network of canals cuts its
way through Britain's countryside
and meanders through town and
city centers.
In the wake of the coronavirus pan-
de mic, more people around the globe
a re re-evalua ting their living situa tions,
with greate r flexibility thanks to remote
work. And in Britain, more people a re
choosing to call these canals - a nd the
narrow boa ts used to navigate the m -
home.
The canals, a vast network once used
to move goods across the country, cut
their way through Britain's countryside
a nd meander through town a nd city cen-
ters. But after being replaced by trains
a nd highways, they fell into disre pair.
Since the 1960s, though, they have
been painstakingly restored and be-
come popula r for leisure cruising. And
for ma ny people, the appeal of turning
weeke nd ja unts or weeklong trips into a
permanently mobile lifestyle is becom-
ing increasingly irresistible.
Tanmim Hussain, 46, a driving in-
structor and mother of four who lives in
North London, bought a canal boa t this
summe r. She felt she would never be
a ble to afford to own a n apartment or
house in London , and the pandemic
made her eager to get out of the city any-
way.
"I decided, let's just be adventurous
a nd throw yourself into something, and
see how it goes," she said. For now, s he
has kept he r London re ntal a nd spends
weeke nds on the boat, cruising with he r
family from village to village.
Her son's education is the biggest con-
sideration, as moving from town to town
would be impossible while he is in
school. But some people with young chil-
dren have taken advantage of more per-
From top: canals can be a tight squeeze for two passing boats. In some tunnels, it's one
boat at a time. Center, the interior of a canal boat. Above, Chris Hall and Rachel Bruce
at home aboard the Glenrich V. "It kind of just felt like doing this is taking back control
a little bit," Mr. Hall said of leaving their London residence and buying the boat.
manent moorings in cities a nd towns.
''My aim this year was to get used to it
and see if I e njoyed the lifestyle:• Ms.
Hussain said. "And see if there is a po-
te ntial for a more perma ne nt future."
For Ms. Bruce and Mr. Hall, the
stresses of work, a mental health strug-
gle and deaths in the family in the last
year made them feel the need for
change. Plus, they had long wanted to
s hake free of what had begun to feel mo-
notonous and flat.
"All of the circumstances of last year
just gave us tha t final push over the
edge," said Mr. Hall, 32. "It kind of just
felt like doing this is ta king back control
a little bit."
Within a week of looking a t their first
boat, they bought it, committing to giv-
ing up their decade-long London life and
ma king the 6-foot 10-inch wide, 50-foot
long steel boat - which they call the
Gle n - their permanent home. They
paid 42,000 pounds, or about $58,000.
Although the boat is powered by
diesel, the couple say they use less fossil
fuels and resources then they did in Lon-
don. This is also part of the appeal, they
PHC1TOGRAPHS BY ANDREW TESTA FOR TIIENEWYORK TIMF.S
say. They have two sola r panels to
power a refrigerator a nd small electron-
ics, and a Wi-Fi-router to get online and
for Mr. Hall's work as a technology con-
sultant.
Life on board is tight but comfortable,
with a small seating area next to a wood-
burning stove, decorated with succu-
lents and a stack of board games at the
ready. A small kitchenette with a gas
stovetop is steps away, a nd further
along the hull is a bathroom with a com-
posting toilet. In the back of the boat is
the bedroom, with a double bed and
small closet.
Boat retaile rs are seeing more first-
time buyers like Ms. Bruce a nd Mr. Hall,
a nd they say the pandemic has been a
factor.
" It's become a little haven really dur-
ing the coronavirus- living on a narrow
boat a nd keeping yourself to yourself,"
said Adr ian Dawson, a sales executive
for Whilton Marina, on the Grand Union
Canal in Northamptonshire.
The Canal & River Trust, which is re-
sponsible for 2,000 miles of waterways
across England a nd Wales, says there
a re now 35,130 boats wending their way
across the country's canals - more than
a t the height of the Industrial Revolu-
tion.
Life on a rustic canal boat is not all ro-
ma nce.
Wate r tanks need filling, toilet waste
needs emptying and tight qua rters
mean little space for luxuries.
P lus boaters without a permanent
mooring have to move every 14 days and
travel at least 21 miles a year, under Ca-
nal & River Trust rules.
In London, where houseboats have
long been an affordable alternative to
more traditional living arrangeme nts,
boat owners protested in June against
new regulations they fear will drive
them from their homes, laying bare
some of the tensions at play as the wa-
terways become more crowded.
Then there's the little matter of win-
ter: Icy canals, slippery surfaces and
staying warm while navigating a re all a
challenge.
Ms. Bruce and Mr. Hall have their
aches to remind them that their muscles
a re not yet fully accustomed to this life.
Unfamilia r with the ins a nd outs of boat
maintenance and navigation, they've
relied on online forums and a guidebook
for help.
" It felt a bit terrifying to buy a hunk of
steel with an engine when you know
nothing about any of those things," Ms.
Bruce said. " But then the second I felt a
little bit scared about that I was like,
'This is what I need in my life.'"
They have noticed some divisions
within the world of canal boating - for
example, when a n older couple with a
flashy boat ts ked and tutted as they
made their way a little clumsily through
a lock.
But they have also found a thriving
community of like-minded fellow boat-
e rs who are quick to lend their expertise.
" I feel like we probably all have some-
thing in common," Ms. Bruce said.
"You know: loving the canals for the
peace and the pace, and not tas ting and
smelling polluted air. And being able to
hear the birds w he n you're sitting out
having tea."
That sha red bond makes it easy to
connect with others journeying along
the canals, who pass with a wave and
some chat.
"Maybe you both feel like you've un-
covered the secret to life," Ms. Bruce
added with a s mile.
Frustrated citizens wait
to schedule vaccination
SEOUL
Once a model in the fight
against Covid, South Korea
suffers from a lag in doses
BY CHOE SANG-HUN
When South Koreans logged on to a gov-
ernme nt webs ite this month to book
Covid-19 vaccine a ppointme nts, a pop-
up window told them there was "just a
bit" of a delay.
"There are 401,032 people waiting in
front of you," read one of the messages
that exasperated South Koreans cap-
tured in screenshots and sha red online.
"Your expected waiting time: 111 hours,
23 minutes a nd 52 seconds."
Most people in the country are still
waiting for shots.
Once held up as a model in fighting
the pa ndemic, South Korea has stum-
bled for months with its vaccination pro-
gram. The country is among the least
vaccinated in the Group of 20 na tions ,
with only 34.9 percent of its 52 million
people having received at least one dose
as of midweek, well below the 55 percent
to 70 percent in other advanced nations.
And now South Koreans are more des-
perate than ever for shots.
The country is in the throes of its
worst wave of infections, with 1,896 new
cases reported on Wednesday, its high-
est daily count. Critics say that the gov-
ernme nt, resting on its early success in
the pandemic, miscalculated how ur-
gently South Korea needed to secure
shots, and that those mistakes are being
amplified at a time when the country ap-
pears to be most vulnerable against the
disease.
T his month, officials told people in
their 50s that their turn to make vaccine
reservations had finally arrived. Up to
10 million people simultaneously logged
on to a governme nt website to request
shots. The system crashed.
Many a pplicants were told they had to
start the process all over again after
hours of waiting. Frustrated South Ko-
reans compared the struggle to that of
Sisyphus. Others likened it to trying to
get a ticket to a sold-out BTS concert.
"We are truly sorry to the people for
causing this trouble," Son Young-rae, a
senior government disease-control offi-
cial, said last week, referring to the grid-
lock. The latest wave of infections
caught the officials off guard.
Just weeks ago, the government con-
sidered relaxing restrictions ahead of
the summer vacation season. Epidemi-
ologists the n warned against such a
move wh ile inoculations remained low
a nd the more contagious Delta variant
of the coronavir us a ppeared to be
spreading.
In a survey conducted last November
by Gallup Korea, 87 percent of South Ko-
rean adults said they were w illing to be
vaccinated as soon as doses became
available, demonstrating a highe r level
of e nthus iasm tha n the 71 percent aver-
age among the 32 countries polled.
Whe n people accused the govern-
ment of being slow in securing vaccines,
officials like Mr. Son told them not to
worry, given South Korea's initial suc-
cess in controlling the spread of
Covid-19. For most of last year, South Ko-
rea won pla udits as its program of ro-
bust testing and contact tracing allowed
the country to avoid the severe lock-
downs seen in other na tions. The South
Korean economy was one of the least af-
fected by the pandemic.
"We don't need to become the fi rst or
second na tion in the world to start vacci-
nation," Mr. Son said in December. Un-
like the United States a nd Britain, which
had to roll out vaccines in a hurry to ad-
dress severe levels of infections, he said,
South Korea had the luxury of being able
to wait and see if the shots were effec-
tive a nd safe.
With the virus largely under control,
A vaccination center in Daegu, South Korea. Most Koreans are still waiting for their
shots. Waiting times to schedule an appointment have been as long as Ill hours.
South Korea did not move aggressively
to order the doses while they were in
early development. And the conse-
quences of that decision have become
woefully apparent.
The country started vaccina ting peo-
ple in late February, more than two
months after Britain. The number of
doses administered daily rarely ex-
ceeded 100,000 until late May, when
large shipme nts of the Oxford-Astra-
Zeneca vaccine arrived a nd the govern-
ment offered incentives, such as promis-
ing to let vaccina ted people to go out-
doors without wearing a mask a nd to go
on group tours. In early June, as many
as 877,000 people daily got vaccinated.
But the government's decis ion not to
push to secure early shipments eventu-
ally put South Korea at the back of the
delivery line. By the time it needed
doses in large numbers, there was a sup-
ply bottleneck. The emergence of more
infectious variants made matte rs worse.
On paper, South Korea has ordered
190 million shots, e nough to fully inocu-
late twice the population. So far, it has
received only 25 million.
The country's desperation for inocu-
lations has put enormous political pres-
sure on President Moon Jae-in. One pri-
ority when he met with P resident Biden
in May was help in securing vaccines.
Washington obliged by providing one
million doses of the Johnson & J ohnson
shot. South Korea also received 780,000
doses from Israel this month, promising
to return a shipment in the future.
It hasn't been e nough.
The consequences of delaying
vaccine orders have become
woefully apparent amid a wave
of infections.
In la te June, South Korea's stockpile
began to run out. Vaccinations slowed to
less than 200,000 people on most days.
By early July, whe n cases star ted to bal-
loon, the number of people vaccinated
daily plummeted as low as 1,665, leading
the governme nt to scrap its pla ns to re-
lax restrictions. This month, officials an-
nounced the most severe Covid precau-
tions yet, including a ban on gatherings
of more than two people in the evening.
"I was confused w hat the government
was doing when it talked about easing
restrictions a head of the s ummer vaca-
tion season while we still had hundreds
of new cases each day and most of the
socially active young people didn't even
have their first vaccine s hots," said Kim
Young-ho, a package courie r in Seoul.
"It's vaccines, not the removal of masks,
tha t the people needed."
Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum has
a pologized for the disappointment and
confusion, admitting that the govern-
ment was too eager to ease restrictions
and lessen the pain of s mall businesses
a nd low-income families who were hurt
the most by the pandemic.
Immunizations a re expected to pick
up rapidly in the coming weeks, with 73
million new doses scheduled to arrive
by the e nd of September. South Korea
reported a total of nea rly one miJlion
newly vaccinated people on Tuesday
and Wednesday alone. And yet the near-
term s uccess of its immuniza tion pro-
gram remains uncertain.
Some of the Moderna vaccines ex-
pected to arrive this month were de-
layed because of an unspecified produc-
tion problem, said Park J i-young, a sen-
ior governme nt coordina tor of vaccine
supplies.
South Korea hopes to receive la rge
shipme nts of a vaccine developed by
Novavax starting in September. No-
vavax has yet to win approval for use in
any country.
Despite the missteps, officials say
they re main confident that they will be
a ble to meet their goal of vaccinating 36
million people - 70 percent of the popu-
lation - with at least one shot by the e nd
of Septe mber.
YOMW'/EPA. VlASHlJTTU(STOCK
WORLD
Top, the original plywood boards with 21 demands put forward in 1980 by striking Polish shipyard workers are now at a museum in the European Solidarity Center in Gdansk,
Poland. Above right, Helena Dmochowska, who worked at the shipyard for 34 years. Above left, taking photographs on the roof of the solidarity center, overlooking the shipyard.
A symbol of unity fractures
POLAND, FROM PAGE I
e rful opposition voice, now serves the
government, ins isting that it only fol-
lows membe rs' interests.
Lech Walesa, Solidarity's founding
leader in Gd a nsk during the s trikes tha t
led to the collapse of Communism in Po-
la nd a nd across Eastern Europe, said
the union today " is so different from
what it was tha t it should not be allowed
to use the same na me."
"Nothing connects me to Solida rity as
it is now. We have completely different
goals a nd interests;• Mr. Walesa said in
his office in the European Solidarity
Cente r, a complex tha t includes the mu-
seum that holds the tablets, as well as a
libra ry and resea rch center.
The table ts list the 21 de ma nds put
forward by Solidarity unde r Mr. Wa-
lesa's leade rship in August 1980. The
first of these was the right to es ta blish
a n inde pende nt trade union, followed by
dema nds that the governme nt respect
constitutional rights a nd freedoms a nd
improve economic cond itions .
The boards a re on loan to the Euro-
pean Solida rity Cente r from a Gdans k
maritime museum, to which Solidarity
activists gave the m for safe keeping in
the 1980s. After Law and Justice took
power in 2015, it dema nded the boards
be returned to the museum, which it
controls through the Culture Ministry.
The European Solida rity Cente r has
refused, complaining tha t "instead of
celebrating the diversity of the firs t Soli-
darity on its 40th a nniversary, we are in
Striking workers at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk, in 1980. It went bankrupt in 1996; the work force is now just a few hundred people.
da nger of us ing me mory to fight fo r
power."
Aleksander Hall, a historia n a nd for-
mer Solidarity activist, d escribed the
s truggle as part of a bigger political bat-
tle in Pola nd to control the heroic but
contentious legacy of the 1980s a nd '90s.
Religious conservatives a nd national-
ists who domina te Law a nd Justice, he
said, "want to confiscate the whole his-
tory of Solidarity for the mselves" a nd, in
order to do that, need to get the tablets
from their ideological foes. For a nyone
seeking political legitimacy a nd support
in Pola nd, Mr. Hall added, "Solidarity is
a great asset."
Solidarity today lobbies against
gay men, lesbians and anyone
else it views as insufficiently
respectful of the Polish nation.
The union has even asserted owner-
ship over Solidarity's famous red a nd
white logo, to the fury of its creator, the
graphic desig ne r Je rzy J a niszewski. Mr.
J a niszewski, in a telephone interview
from Spain, where he lives, insisted he
holds the copyright a nd never gave it to
a union that does " not defend the inter-
ests of worke rs but of the governme nt."
Mr. Michnik, the former Solidarity
s upporter, said the united front created
by the struggle against communism
was always going to splinte r once the
common enemy was defeated.
But Mr. Michnik, now the editor in
chief of Gazeta Wyborcza, a liberal
newspaper opposed to Law a nd Jus tice,
considers today's government-alig ned
version of Solidarity a menace.
" Back then it was a mass move ment
of millions with different tende ncies and
currents, but its esse ntial premise was
tha t Pola nd be democratic, tolerant and
pro-Western,'' he said. "Today's Solidari-
ty is a n organization with only a few peo-
ple, which supports the destruction of
democracy a nd supports a nti-Western
forces."
The rift flows in part from two starkly
different views of Mr. Walesa, who was
celebrated around the world and was
awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983,
but is now reviled by his former union's
leade rship a nd its governme nt allies.
The bad blood is personal, fed by Mr.
Walesa's conte mpt for J aroslaw Kaczyn-
ski, Law a nd Justice's leade r, a nd his
twin brothe r, Lech Kaczyns ki, a former
president, who died in 2010.
"They were ins ignificant activists,"
said Mr. Walesa, noting tha t, unlike him-
self a nd most other importa nt playe rs in
Solidarity, J a roslaw Kaczynski was "not
even a rrested" after the Communist
Pa rty imposed martial law in December
1981.
The governing party has a rival na r-
rative in which Mr. Walesa is cast as a
tra itor for negotia ting a peaceful trans-
fer of power w ith the Com munist leader-
ship in 1989.
Law and Justice has re pea tedly ac-
Jt.ANH>l IBA1UN/SYGMA, V1ActTIY1MAGIS
PHOTOCRAPHS BY MACIEKNABRDALIK FOR TIIE NEW YORK TIMES
cused Mr. Walesa of allowing me mbers
of the former communist elite to escape
punishment a nd profit from the tra ns i-
tion to capitalism a t the expense of ordi-
na ry Poles.
The same narrative has been em-
braced by Solidarity, led since 2010 by
Piotr Duda, a pugnacious fo rme r para-
trooper a nd lathe opera tor at a now de-
funct steel mill, who accuses Pola nd's
previous liberal governme nt and Mr.
Walesa of selling out ordina ry workers.
After Mr. Walesa became Pola nd's
first freely elected president in 1990, the
country embarked on a drive to over-
ha ul its economy through a crash pro-
gram of privatization.
According to Roman Sebastyanski -
a n official at the Solidarity Heritage In-
stitute, which was set up by the trade
union in 2019 as a rival to the Europea n
Solida rity Cente r - this "primitive
shock therapy" betrayed ma ny who had
supported the a nti-communist cause,
leaving the m jobless.
"We had a bloodless revolution, but
the re were huge costs: Hundreds of fac-
tories a nd workplaces closed," he said.
Tha t carnage is still visible a t the
Gda nsk shipyard, whe re a work force of
a round 17,000 unde r communis m has
shrunk to just a few hundred people as
la nd has been sold to private investors.
The main shipyard went bankrupt in
1996,
"We were really cr ying when it
closed," recalled Hele na Dmochowska,
who worked for 34 yea rs as a crane oper-
a tor a t the shipya rd. "How could this
happe n to such a big and powerful work-
place?"
The European Solidarity Cente r,
which rejoices over the defea t of Com-
munism, makes no mention of the price
paid by former shipbuilders who lost
their jobs, Mr. Sebastyans ki said. "The y
exis t in outer s pace over there," he said.
Ope ned in 2014, the huge center tow-
ers over the now mostly derelict forme r
shipyard a nd a s mall brick building
housing a modest rival museum con-
trolled by today's Solidarity. The two
museums are nominally pa rtners but
promote dia metrically opposed agen-
das, one celebrating Mr. Walesa a nd Po-
la nd's part in a bigge r European story,
the other focused na rrowly on Polis h
shipbuilders.
Aleksa ndra Dulkiewicz, the liberal
mayor of Gdansk, la mented that the
struggle to control Solidarity's legacy
had gotten so out of ha nd. The boards
with the 21 dema nds, she added, had
fallen victim to a cam paign by Law and
Justice to "control a nd rewrite history."
" Every country, every history, every
legend needs its symbols , and one of the
most importa nt symbols for us are these
ta blets with the 21 de ma nds," she said.
"This is why the re is such a big fight."
Anatol Magdziarz contributed report-
ing.
Promise of democracy
is slow to bear fruit
TUNISIA , FROM PAGE I
For Tunis ia, Mr. Kaboub said, it was a
"perfect s torm on the economic fro nt;'
a nd one that was long incoming.
Its biggest problem is its external
debt, inhe rited from the form er dictator-
ship. To service that debt, successive
governments h ave been forced to focus
on earning foreign currency.
And since the 1970s, Tunisia has be-
come caught in a commonly seen devel-
opment trap between the global North
a nd South: Poorer countries export
cheap agricultural products or raw ma-
terials, while importing more expe nsive
e nergy a nd industrial goods from riche r
ones.
The result was a hole Tunis ia could
never climb out of.
Despite calls after the Tunisian revo-
lution for the new governme nt to write
off its "odious debt" - a te rm used fo r
fina ncial obligations inc urred by
despotic regimes that ma ny a rg ue
s hould not be binding - lawma kers
there chose not to confront the country's
mainly European creditors, hoping not
to ruffle rela tions .
They also made little effort to c ha nge
the struc ture of the Tunis ia n economy,
which imports more tha n it exports, of-
te n driven by vested interests that have
monopolies on importing certain goods.
And so instead of growing wheat to
feed its population, Tunisia uses its most
fertile la nd a nd water to grow strawber-
ries for export. And it imports fuel a nd
food to support its tourist industry, even
after tha t was rendered unviable by ter-
rorism a nd the pa ndemic, Mr. Kaboub
s aid.
Mohamed Dhia-Hammami, a political
s cientist who has studied the Tunisian
transition closely, said the economic
progra ms introduced were the same as
those used in Eastern Europe afte r the
tra nsition from Communism, and had
ma ny of the same flaws.
"They did not prevent the rise of the
oligarchy," he said. " It is not surprising
to see s imila r problems whe n the poli-
cies are the same."
Monica Marks, a professor of Middle
East PoUtics a t New York University
Abu Dha bi, who has had long experi-
e nce with Tunisia, said that there was a
d earth of knowledge about the country
a mong Western officials, w hich ha m-
pered meaningful assista nce.
"I noticed right off the bat in 2011;• she
s aid, "the United Sta tes a nd other West-
e rn de mocracies knew almost nothing
a bout Tunis ian politics."
Ms. Marks said that structural issues
s uch as security sector reform, judicial
reform, m edia reform a nd youth unem-
ployme nt should have been the main fo-
c us of the transition after the popular
uprising overth rew the country's au-
thorita ria n president of 23 years, Zine
el-Abidine Ben Ali.
But Western officials were obses-
s ively foc used on the Islamists -
na mely the Ennahda, or Renaissance,
A year aft er the 201 I revolution, a cafe, top, near the Interior Ministry in Tunis was
surrounded by razor wire to keep protesters away. A business district in Tunis this
week, above, was nearly deserted after the president suspended Parliament.
CORRECTIONS
• An a rticle on Monday a bout Big Oil in
Nigeria misstated the surna me of a
s pokesma n for the Gbara ma tu King-
d om. He is Godspower Gbenekama, not
Beneka m a.
• An article on Monday about Dr. J oseph
Mercola, an osteopathic physicia n, re-
fe rred incorrectly to the outcome of reg-
ula tory actions against Dr. Me rcola. He
paid millions of dollars in refunds to
c ustomers as a result of a settle ment
with the U.S. Feder al Trade Commis -
s ion ; he was not fined millions of dollars
by the Food a nd Drug Administration.
pa rty tha t swept early elections - a nd
w here they were going a nd what they
represented.
"In conversations, those sorts of ques-
tions a te up almost all the oxygen in the
room," Ms. Marks s aid. "It was almost
impossible to get a nybody to ask a n-
other q uestion."
Late r, Western officials became fo-
cused on building consens us a mong
Tunisia's political leade rs - a nd for
w hich fo ur organizations were awarded
the Nobel Peace P rize in 2015 - to the
point tha t it became a "fetish ;' she said.
After the 2011 revolution , Al Qaeda
a nd othe r extremists were quick to mo-
bilize ne tworks of recruits.
Terroris m burst into the open in 2012
w hen the U.S. Embassy in Tunis came
under attack from a 1nob. Ove r the years
that followed, extre mist cells carried out
a string of political assassinations a nd
suicide a ttacks that sha ttered Tunisia ns'
optimis m and nearly de railed the de mo-
cratic transition.
Mass casualties in shootings of for-
eign tourists a t a coastal resort and in
the National Bardo Museum in Tunis
dealt a body blow to the faltering econ-
omy by hitting the lucrative tourism in-
dustry a nd foreig n investment whe n it
was needed most.
The United States s tepped in with
cr itical security a nd counterterrorism
s upport in one of its most successful in-
te rventions since 2001, training and as-
s isting Tunisia n security forces, a nd
s upplying them with military eq uip-
me nt, but so d iscreetly that the Ameri-
can forces the mselves were virtually in-
v isible.
By 2019, some 150 Americans were
training a nd advising their Tunisian
counte rparts in one of the largest mis-
s ions of its kind on the African continent,
according to American officials. The val-
ue of American milita ry supplies deliv-
e red to the country increased to $119
million in 2017 from $12 million in 2012,
government data show.
The assista nce helped Tunisia defeat
the broader threa t of te r roris m, but gov-
e rnme nt ministers noted tha t the cost of
combating te rroris m, while unavoid-
able, burned a larger hole in the national
budget.
But it is the structure of the economy
that re mains the root of the problem, Mr.
Kaboub, of Denison Univers ity, said. All
of Tunisia's political parties have ide nti-
cal economic plans, based on World
Bank and Interna tional Mone ta ry Fund
guidelines.
It was the same development plat-
form used by the ousted pres ident, Mr.
Ben Ali, Mr. Kaboub said.
"Right now," he said, "everybody in
Tunisia is begging for a n I.M.F. loan, a nd
it is going to be seen as the solution to
the crisis. But it is really a trap. It's a
Band-Aid - the infection is s till there."
Lilia Blaise contributed reporting from
Tunis.
• An article on Monday about a declin-
ing interest in investment banking as a
career choice a mong young profession-
als misidentified the class of a univer-
s ity student. Arme n Panossian is a ris-
ing senior at Rutgers Univer sity, not a
rising junior.
• An article in the weekend edition about
Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the exiled Be-
larus oppos ition leader, misstated the
action ta ken against the opposition poli-
tician Valery Tsepkalo before the elec-
tion in Bela rus last year. While he was
barred from running, he was not jailed.
 WORLD

Shots for Mexican workers also help the U.S.

TIJUANA
Employees are bused
across the border to get
vaccinated in San Diego
BY MARIA ABI-HABIB
They labor in factories in Mexico pro-
ducing goods U.S. consumers enjoy. But
w here A merican communities ar e
awash in unused coronavirus vaccines,
Mexican worke rs a re often ha rd-
pressed to find a singl e shot.
On one recent morning, however, hun-
dreds of worker s from t he factories
known as maquiladoras were waved
across the border into San Diego, with-
out visas or passports, a nd rolle d up
their sleeves to be vaccina ted. An hour
later, they were b ack on production lines
in Tijua na.
The goa l was to protect not jus t the
worke rs, but also the intertwined Ame r-
ican a nd Mexica n economies.
"If the maquiladoras can't ope ra te,
then we don't get our Coca-Cola," said
Lydia Ikeda, senior director of Covid op-
e rations a t Univer sity of Califor nia San
Diego Health, which is helping run the
progr a m. "We cannot be isola ted."
The cross-borde r vaccina tion effort is
meant to re medy the kind of d ispa rity in
vaccine access that economists have
warned could hurt all countries: Unless
privileged na tions like the United States
s hare their wealth of Covid-19 vaccines
with poorer nations, e xperts say, a ro-
bust global economic rebound will re-
main out of reach.
The Biden administra tion has
pledged to s ha re 80 million doses, in-
cluding fo ur million for Mexico.
But along the U.S.-Mexico border,
whe re a pa nde mic border closure and
the lack of vaccines in Mexico threate n
to keep the local economic recovery a t
bay, officials from both na tions have
found a way to s hare s urplus vaccines
from Texas and California with Mexi-
cans on the other s ide.
"We are divided by a virtual line," Dr.
Ikeda said, gesturing to the borde r. "To
get the m vaccina ted is the only way for
us to get out of the pandemic."
For Dr. Ikeda, the prolonged pain of
the pandemic has only stre ngthened he r
belief that to beat the virus a nd restore
social a nd economic normalcy, na tions
mus t work togethe r.
At the sta rt of the pa nde mic, as gov-
ernme nts closed their borders a nd
hoarded masks and ventila tors, it some-
times seemed globaliza tion itself was
brea king down.
Supply chains dried up, cons umers
scrambled to find pasta and factories to
find compute r chips.
For Mexico a nd the United States, re-
s toring coope ra tion is especially vital.
Bilateral trade between the countries
reached $612 billion in 2019. Ame rican
compa nies manufacture billions of dol-
la rs worth of goods in Mexico, with
m aquiladoras assembling hundreds of
thousands of Ford cars a nd Honeywell
products every year.
The idea of sha ring coronavirus vac-
cines with workers just acros.s the bor-
de r first occurred to Ca rlos Gonzalez
Gutierre z, Mexico's consul gene ral in
San Diego, when he watch ed as college
s tude nts a nd undocume nted workers
plucking berries in California's fields re-
ceived the vaccine with rela tive ease
while Mexico struggled to provide them
for its elderly.
At the same time, as the number of
America ns seeking coronavirus vac-
cines began to pla teau in May, doses of
J ohnson & J ohnson a pproached their
expira tion dates in San Diego County.
"The re is something ver y unfair in the
fac t that my 22-yea r-old daug hter could
be vaccina ted he re while people in my
country, over 60 years old, had to wait in
line for their turn," Mr. Gonzalez said in
a n interview.
Mr. Gonzalez reached out to San
Diego County officials with a proposal:
Why not give the vaccines nearing expi-
ra tion to the thousands of Mexican fac-
tory workers just across the border?
Soon, Mexican a nd Ame rica n officials
agreed that San Diego's excess vac-
cines, all J ohnson & J ohnson, would be
sold to Ame rican compa nies with fac-
tories in Mexico.
By May, San Diego County received
pe rmission from the fede ral govern-
me nt - which owns the vaccines - to
sell the shots, and worked with the De-
pa rtme nt of Homeland Security to allow
Mexicans without v isas to cross the bor-
de r to receive them.
The pilot program was la unched in
la te May with Ame rican companies tha t
included Coca-Cola a nd Poly, a Califor-
nia communications compa ny that built
the head set that Neil Armstrong used to
tra ns mit news of his moon landing in
1969.
The compa nies bused their factory
Working on assembly lines in the Tijuana
factory of Poly, right, which manufactures
headse ts, telephones and other office
equipment Above, an organizer with the
vaccination program explaining to Poly
employees and family members how the
vaccinations would be administered.
workers to the border, where health care
workers from U.C. San Diego adminis-
tered the vaccines in a controlled area.
The compa nies also committed to pro-
viding vaccines to their e mployees' fam-
ilies and to frontline worke rs in the s ta te
of Baja California, where Tijua na is, ad-
ministering 26,000 shots by early July.
"The two cities a re very inte rdepend-
ent;' Ale x Bus ta ma nte, a senior adviser
to Poly, said of Tijuana a nd San Diego.
" It's not just about the numbe rs of peo-
ple who cross every day for school or
shopping or visiting family. You have
fields he re in Baja California that feed
the U.S. The cities can't be de-linked."
The s uccess of the pilot program led to
its expans ion.
Officials in Hidalgo County, Texas, a n-
nounced this month tha t hundreds of
Mexican fa ctory worke rs would be
bused in for vaccinations from Reynosa,
a city in the northern Mexican sta te of
Tamaulipas, where some 188,000 work-
e rs ma nufacture goods for the global
economy.
In El P aso, county officials recently
a nnounced the start of their own pro-
g ra m, which seeks to donate up to
50,000 vaccines to factory workers in Ci-
udad Jua rez, in the sta te of Chihuahua.
Mexican a nd local U.S. officials hope
the maquiladora vaccination program
will encourage the United Sta tes to re-
open the la nd borde r with Mexico. Its
closing dried up the flow of s hoppers
w ho used to cross over to the United
States.
"As much as we think Mexico may de-
pe nd upon us, we depe nd a lot on Mex-
ico," said Nora Vargas, a supe rvisor on
the San Diego County board.
Nearly 200 San Diego compa nies
along the borde r have gone out of busi-
ness in the last year, Mrs. Va rgas said.
Families living on both s ides of the
border no longer crisscros.s to attend
weddings and birthdays, or to meet up
for dinner and a movie. One of the last
vestiges of the thriving, interconnected
life that once straddled the borde r a re
the Mexican schoolchildren who still
cross into the United Sta tes daily to at-
te nd private schools, lunchboxes swing-
ing in ha nd, exempt from the restric-
tions.
The goal was to protect
not just the workers, but
also the intertwined American
ancl Mexican economies.
While Mexicans cannot e nte r the
United States for nonessential travel,
American citizens can travel to Mexico,
w here m any go for less expensive de n-
tal work or because it is cheaper to live
in Tijua na and commute to San Diego, a
30-minute drive.
On a recent day on the San Diego s ide
of the border crossing, a woman carted a
wagon stacked with boxes of Hot Pock-
e ts into Mexico. An olde r American vet-
eran walked from San Diego County
back to his apartment in Tijua na while
complaining aloud a bout illegal immi-
grants a nd the cost of living in Califor-
nia.
On the Tijua na side, Jose Alejandro
Aguilar Cervantes boarded a bus a t the
Poly fac tory, prepa red to head up to San
Diego with some 400 others for a vacci-
na tion. After years of unsuccessfully a p-
plying fo r a visa to the United States, he
said, he was finally being allowed entry,
a lbeit fleetingly.
" I often look across the border, imag-
ining w ha t life is like there," Mr. Cervan-
tes said. "The vaccine will make me feel
like we a re kind of like them."

Defiance after a mask advisory

MIAMI
Some states across U.S.
oppose new mandates to
reinstate coverings indoors
BY PATRICIA MAZZE I
Even before the Cente rs for Disease
Control a nd Prevention recomme nded
this week that vaccinated people in co-
ronavirus hot s pots a round the United
States go back to wearing face cover -
ings indoors, a res istance had been
building against a ny new masking re-
quire ments, no ma tter the resurgence of
infections.
Hours before the C.D.C.'s a nnounce-
ment on Tuesday, the school board in
Broward County, Fla., north of Miami,
postponed a meeting on back-to-school
protection rules after a small crowd of
maskless adults a nd children showed up
to the lobby of the school district head-
quarte rs a nd got into a tense exchange
with masked me mber s of the local
teache rs' union.
In Missouri, where rampant Covid-19
has once again flooded hospitals, St.
Louis County reinstated a mask ma n-
date on Monday, ahead of the C.D.C.'s
updated advice - only to face a lawsuit
hours later from Eric Schmitt, the state's
Republican attorney general, who ac-
c used the county of " unacceptable a nd
uncons titutional" overreach .
By Tuesd ay night, the St. Louis
County Council - meeting in a packed
c hambe r where a woma n was hoisting a
s ign that read, "STOP T HE T YRANNY"
- had voted to overturn the ma ndate,
thoug h the measure's fate may ulti-
mately be decided by the courts.
"You asked us to s tay home," Rita
Heard Days, the council chairwoma n,
told the director of the county's public
health depa rtment before voting to lift
the mask ma ndate. "You asked us to put
on masks. You asked us to stay six feet
a part. We have foll owed your orde rs,
a nd yet we a re still in a predicament. So
something is not working."
The virus has changed, Dr. Faisal
Khan, the public health director, told her.
A surge in virus infections, fueled by
the more contagious Delta va ria nt, has
led the C.D.C. to respond with guidance
that ha rked back to a year ago, when
ma ny state a nd local officials were im-
posing mask mandates. And on Thurs-
day, Preside nt Biden was expected to
a nnounce tha t all civilia n U.S. govern-
me nt e mployees must be vaccina ted or
s ubmit to regula r testing, social dis tanc-
ing, mask require ments a nd travel re-
s trictions.
"We are still in a predicament.
So something is not working."
But after months of s hutdowns, a nd
with three vaccines available to protect
Americans, those trying to ge t people to
wear face coverings again in the middle
of a long, hot summer a re encountering
defia nce a nd hostility.
Four Republican governors, Greg Ab-
bott of Texas, Doug Ducey of Arizona,
Brian Kemp of Georgia a nd Pete Rick-
e tts of Nebraska, s ignaled their opposi-
tion to the recommenda tion.
Nine states - Arizona, Arka nsas,
Florida, Iowa, Montana, North Dakota,
South Carolina, Tennes.see a nd Texas -
had already banned or limited face
m ask ma ndates, leaving cities a nd
counties with few options to fight the vi-
rus spread.
Even in Washington Sta te, w here
tough virus restrictions last year e n-
joyed s ubsta ntial public backing, there
a ppear ed to be sca nt support for
s tepped-up masking now.
f Cava, the mayor of Mia mi-Dade County,
. '
\
~ a nnounced on Wednesday a n indoor
"Everybody has acces.s to vaccines in
our country at the mome nt, and so I
think that if people are not taking adva n-
tage of tha t, it's poor pe rsonal decision-
ma king," said State Senator Mark Mul-
le t, a Democrat.
Gov. J ay Inslee, a Democra t, urged all
residents to follow the federal g uidelines
a nd a nnounced tha t mask require ments
in schools would re main. He s uggested
tha t the s tate could require vaccinations
for eligible students if rates do not in-
crease.
Some s tates a nd cities moved quickly
to adopt the C.D.C.'s recomme ndations.
Mayor Quinton Lucas of Kansas City,
Mo., reinsta ted a mask ma ndate. Gov.
Steve Sisolak of Nevada, a Democrat,
ordered tha t reside nts of counties with
hig h ra tes of trans mission - including
Cla rk County, home to Las Vegas -
wear masks in public indoor spaces
sta rting on Friday.
The Illinois Depa rtment of P ublic
Health recommended masks for every-
one in places with rampa nt infections.
In California, with more tha n 90 pe r-
cent of the state facing subs tantial or
hig h tra nsmission rates, state health of-
ficials on Wednesday recommended
masking in all public indoor settings,
though they s topped short of a ma ndate.
" It's a n inconvenience and it's a nnoy-
ing," said Tina Kim, 40, who sat on the
patio of a Mexican restaurant in Los An-
geles on Tuesday. "But I don't think
there is a reliable way of filtering who is
vaccina ted when you walk into a store.''
The C.D.C. recomme nded that people
wear masks indoors in counties with
substa ntial or high infection rates, or
more tha n 50 new cases per 100,000 peo-
ple in a seven-day period. By that meas-
ure, all reside nts of Florida, Arkansas
a nd Louisiana should wear masks in-
doors. Nea rly two-thirds of U.S. counties
qualify, ma ny of them concentra ted in
the South.
In Florida, which never had a state-
wide mask ma ndate a nd has seen a big
rise in virus cases and hospitalizations,
Gov. Ron Desantis, a Republican, made
no mention of the C.D.C. guidelines at a
news conference on Wednesday. Last
week, he had reiterated that asking peo-
ple to cover their faces goes agains t the
message that they needed to get a vac-
cine.
But in South Florida, Daniella Levine
mask requireme nt fo r all county-ope ra t-

~-. 1 -~ ed fac ilities a nd a s trong recomme nda-

tion for masks in all la rge c rowds or
close spaces.
"We have all sacrificed too much in
this past almost year-a nd-a-half," s he
said. "We cannot turn back now.''

Reporting was contributed by A na Facio-

Krajcer, Neil MacFarq uhar, Jesus
SCOTT Md i'ffi'RE FOR TilE NEW YORK TIMES Jim enez, Kellen Browning and Kristine
A store in Miami where face masks are optional. Florida is one of nine states to ban or White. Susan C. Beachy contributed re-
limit face mask mandates, leaving cities with few options to fight the virus spread. search.
Business
On solar farms such as the one developed by Ranger Power near Flint, Mich., workers are often nonunion construction laborers who earn hourly wages and whose benefits benerits don't match those of unionized employees at traditional fossil fuel industries.
Big investment firms back
green energy, but are not
funding 'good-paying' jobs
BY NOAM SCHEIBER
To hear Democrats tell it, a green job is
supposed to be a good job - a nd not just
good for the planet.
The Gree n New Deal, first introduced
in the U.S. Congress in 2019, sought to
"cre ate millions of good, high-wage
jobs." And in March, w h en President Bi-
den announced a $2.3 trillion infrastruc-
ture pla n, he emphasized the "good-pay-
ing" union jobs it would produce while
reining in climate change.
"My Ame r ican Jobs P lan w ill put hun-
dreds of thousands of people to work,"
Mr. Biden said, "paying the same exact
rate tha t a union man or woma n would
get."
But on its current trajectory, the
g reen economy is shaping up to look less
like the industrial workplace that lifted
American workers into the middle class
in the 20th century than something
more a kin to an Amazon warehouse or a
fleet of Ube r drivers: grueling work
schedules, few unions, middling wages
a nd limited benefits.
Kellogg Dipzinski has seen this up
close, a t Assembly Sola r, a nearly 2,000-
acre solar farm unde r construction near
Flint, Mich.
"Hey I see your ads for help," Mr.
Dipzins ki, a n organizer with the local
electrical worke rs union, texted the
site's project ma nager in May. "We have
manpower. I'll be out that way Fr iday."
"Hahahahaha . . . yes - help needed
on unskilled low wage worke rs," was the
response.
For worke rs used to the pay sta nd-
a rds of traditional e ne rgy industries,
such declarations may be ja r ring. Build-
ing an electricity plant powered by fossil
fuels usually requires hundreds of elec-
tricians, pipe fitters, millw rights a nd
boilermake rs who typically earn more
than $100,000 a year in wages and bene-
fits whe n they a re unionized.
But on sola r farms, worke rs are often
nonunion construction la bore rs who
earn a n hourly wage in the upper teens
with modest be nefits - even as the
projects a re backed by some of the la rg-
est investme nt firms in the world. In the
case of Assembly Sola r, the backer is
D.E. Shaw, with more than S50 billion in
assets unde r ma nagement, whose re-
newable ene rgy a rm owns a nd will ope r-
a te the plant.
While Mr. Bide n has proposed highe r
wage floors for such work, the Sena te
prospects for this approach a re murky.
And a bsent such protections - or even
with them - the re's a nagging concern
a mong worker advocates tha t the shift
to green jobs may reinforce inequality
rathe r than alleviate it.
"The clean tech industry is incredibly
a nti-union," said Jim Har rison, the di-
rector for re newable e nergy at the Util-
ity Worker s Union of Ame rica . " It 's a lot
of transient wor k, work that is marginal,
precarious a nd very difficult to be able
to organize."
THE LESSONS OF 2009
Since 2000, the United States has los t
a bout two million private-sector union
jobs, which pay above-average wages.
To help revive s uch "high-quality mid-
dle-class" e mployme nt, as Mr. Biden
refers to it, he has proposed fede ral sub-
sidies to plug abandoned oil a nd gas
wells, build electric vehicles and cha rg-
ing stations a nd speed the transition to
re ne wable e nergy.
The Sena te voted this week to take up
a $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill
that would ma ke far-reaching invest-
ments in Ame rica's public wor ks sys-
Joe Duvall, above left, a union officer at a Michigan fossil-fuel plant, where hourly salaries begin at around $40. Greg Remington, right, seeking union jobs at a solar plant.
te rn. In negotiations, Mr. Bide n a nd
De mocratic leade rs agreed to conces-
sions, accepting less new federal money
for clean e ne rgy projects than they had
wanted.
Industry studies, including one cited
by the White House, suggest that vastly
increasing the number of wind a nd sola r
far ms could create over half a million
jobs yearly over a decade - most of
the m in construction a nd ma nufactur-
ing.
David Popp, a n economis t a t Syra-
cuse University in New York State, said
those job estima tes we re roughly in line
with his study of the green jobs created
by the Recovery Act of 2009, but with
two caveats: First, the green jobs creat-
ed the n coincided with a loss of jobs else-
where, including high-paying, unionized
industrial jobs. And the green jobs did
not a ppear to raise the wages of workers
who filled the m.
The effect of Mr. Bide n's plan, which
would go furthe r in displacing well-paid
workers in foss il-fuel-related industries,
could be similarly disappointing.
In 2023, a coal- and gas-powered plant
called D.E. Karn, about a n hour away
from the Assembly Sola r site in Michi-
gan, is scheduled to s hut down. The
plant's 130 mainte nance and operations
workers, w ho a re re presented by the
Utility Worke rs Union of America a nd
whose wages begin around $40 a n hour
plus be nefits, a re gua ranteed jobs a t the
same wage within 60 miles. But the un-
ion, which has lost near ly 15 percent of
the 50,000 membe rs na tionally that it
had five years ago, says ma ny will have
to take less a ppealing jobs .
"A ha ndful will retire," said J oe Du-
vall, the local union president. "The
younger ones I think have been search-
ing for wha t they'd like to do outside of
Karn."
While some of the new green con-
struction jobs, s uch as building new
power lines, may pay well, ma ny will
pay less tha n traditional e nergy indus-
try construction jobs.
Building a new fossil fuel pla nt in
Michigan employs hundreds of s killed
workers who typically make a t least $60
a n hour in wages a nd benefits, said Mike
Barnwell, who leads the carpenters un-
ion in the state.
By contrast, a bout two-thirds of the
roughly 250 workers employed on a
typical utility-scale solar project are
lower-skilled , according to Anthony
Prisco, the head of the rene wable e ne r-
gy practice for the staffing firm Aerotek.
Mr. Prisco said his company pays
"around $20" per hour for these posi-
tions, depending on the market, a nd tha t
they a re gene rally nonunion.
Mr. Eiden has proposed that clean e n-
e rgy projects, which a re subsidized by
federal tax credits, pay construction
The solar industry has so far developed grueling work schedules, middling wages and steady profits for wealthy investors.
At green energy plants, workers
a re often nonunion construction
laborers who receive modest
hourly wages and benefits.
worke rs so-called prevailing wages - a
level set by each locality.
When utilities build their own pla nts,
they have little incentive to drive down
la bor costs because their rate of re turn
is set by regulators - a round 10 pe rcent
of their initial investme nt a year, accord-
ing to securities filings.
But when a solar farm is built and
owned by a nother compa ny - typically
a green e ne rgy upstart, a traditional e n-
ergy gia nt or a n investme nt firm like
D.E. Shaw, the owner of Assembly Solar
in Michigan - tha t company has every
incentive to hold down costs.
A lower price helps secure the pur-
chase agreement. And because the reve-
nue is largely determined by the pur-
chase agreement, a company like D.E.
Shaw m ust keep costs low to have a
cha nce of earning the double-digit re-
turns tha t a regulated utility earns .
UNION LABOR, 'WHERE POSSIBLE'
In mid-2019, the electrical worker s un-
ion in Flint elected Greg Re mington as
its business ma nager and de facto
leader. Around the same time, Mr. Rem-
ington ra n into a n official with Ra nger
Power, the compa ny developing the
project for D.E. Shaw, a t a local pla nning
commission meeting.
" He was all smiles - 'Oh, yeah, we
look forward to meeting,'" Mr. Re ming-
ton said of the official. " But he never re-
turned a nother phone call. I sent e mails
a nd he never got back to me."
Developme nt is the stage of a sola r
project in which a company buys or
leases la nd, secures permits a nd negoti-
a tes a power purchase agreeme nt with a
utility. Afte r that, the developer may
cede control of the project to a company
that will build, own and operate it.
But the two compa nies ofte n work in
tandem, as in the case of D.E. Shaw and
Ra nger Power, which are joint-venture
partners "on certain Midwest projects
a nd assets," according to a Ranger
spokeswoma n. D.E. Shaw helps fund
Ra nger Powe r's projects, a nd its in-
volveme nt provides the resources and
credibility to get projects off the ground.
In a 2018 letter to a local building
trades council in Southern Illinois,
known as the Egyptian Building Trades,
a Ranger Power official wrote that a so-
la r project the compa ny was developing
in the area was "committed to using the
appropriate affilia tes of the Egyptian
Building Trades, where possible, to pro-
vide s kiUed craftsmen a nd wome n to
perform the construction of the project."
The letter said any e ntity tha t acquired
the proje ct would be required to honor
the commitme nt.
But the project mostly hired nonunion
workers t o install sola r panels. Accord-
ing to a complaint filed by a local union
last fall with the Illinois Comme rce
Commission, the construction contrac-
tor has used worker s who are not quali-
fied a nd not s upervised by a qualified
person "to perfor m electrical wiring a nd
connections" a nd paid them less than
the union rate.
Prairie State Solar, a n e ntity owned by
D.E. Shaw that was created to oversee
the project, has denied the claims.
Prairie State has hired union tradespeo-
ple for a portion of the work.
Ranger officials likewise played up
the construction jobs that the Asse mbly
Solar project would bring to Michigan.
But by the time Mr. Remington got in-
volved, the county had approved the
project a nd he had little leverage to en-
sure that they were union jobs. "A lot of
this stuff, you've got to strike while the
iron is hot/' he said.
County officials say that the project is
bringing large be nefits - including pay-
PlnTOGRAPHS BY ERINSOW'Fflll[ NEW YORK TIMES
me nts to landowner s and tax revenue -
a nd that they ha ve no sa y over orga-
nized la bor's involveme nt. "I don't think
it's our respons ibility in a ny way to in-
te rvene on be half of or against a union,"
said Greg Brodeur, one of the cou nty
commissione rs.
'LIKE A MOVING ASSEMBLY LINE'
On a n afte rnoon in mid-May, several la-
borers coming off their shift a t Assem-
bly Sola r said they were grateful for the
work, which they said paid $16 an hour
a nd provided health insurance and con-
tributions to a retire ment plan. Two said
they had moved to the a rea from Te n-
nessee a nd two from Mississippi, whe re
they had made S9 to $15 a n hour - one
as a cook, two in construction a nd one as
a mecha nic.
One of the me n, w ho ide ntified himself
as Travis Shaw, said he typically worked
from 7 a.m. until 5 p.m. six days a week,
including overtime. Anothe r worker,
Quenda rious Fos ter, who had been on
the job for two weeks, said the workers
motivated the mselves by trying to beat
their daily record, which stood a t 30
"tracke rs," each holding several dozen
pa nels .
"Sola r is like a moving assembly line,"
said Mr. Prisco, the staffing agency
leader. "Instead of the product moving
down the line, the people move. It rep-
licates itself over and over again across
1,000, 2,000 acres." Mr. Pr isco a nd other
experts said meeting a tight deadline
was often critical. In some cases, project
owners must pay a penalty to the elec-
tricity buyer if the re a re delays.
Elsewhere on the site, Mr. Remington
pointed out a worke r whom he had seen
splicing together cables, but she de-
clined to comment whe n a pproached by
a reporter. Mr. Re mington, who visits
freque ntly a nd has the moxie of a man
who, by his own accounting, has been
chased a round "by some of the finest
sheriffs" in Michigan during hunting
season, said he had asked the worker
the day before if she was a licensed jour-
neyma n or if a journeyman was directly
supervising her work, as state regula-
tions require. The worker indicated that
neither was the case.
A spokeswoma n for McCarthy Build-
ing Companies, the construction con-
tractor for D.E. Shaw Renewable Invest-
me nts, said that all electrical appre n-
tices were supervised by licensed jour-
neyme n a t the state-ma nda ted ratio of
three-to-one or better and tha t all
splices involved a licensed electricia n.
During a brief encounter on site with
a re porter, Brian Timmer, the project
ma nager who had excha nged a text
with a union organizer, said, "Tha t's the
reason I can't talk to you" whe n he was
asked a bout union la bor. " It gets a lot of
people upset." (Mr. Remington said he
was later told by McCarthy that it might
use union electricians for a limited as-
signment.)
The county electr ical inspector, Dane
Deister, said that McCarthy had
produced licenses when he had asked to
see them, but that he hadn't " physically
gone through a nd counted" the licenses
a nd didn't know how many licensed
electricia ns were on site.
Mr. Re mington said that he was con-
vinced tha t the re were far fewer tha n a
project of this scale required. "Tha t's a
high-voltage splice box right there," he
said while driving a round the perimeter,
alluding to potential dangers. He
pointed to a nother box a nd said, "Tell
me if you don't think that's electrical
work."
Late r, explaining why he inves ted so
much effort in a job site where few of his
me mbers are likely to be e mployed, Mr.
Remington reflected on the future.
"Well, this is going to be the only show in
town,'' he said. "I want us to have a piece
of it."

Congratulations! It's a start-up.
New babies get showered
with gifts; why shouldn't
new businesses too?
BY ALYSON KRUEGER
Sid Singh, 36, was joking recently with a
friend that everyone he knew seemed to
be having their third baby while he w as
bringing something entirely different
into the world. He had just quit his con-
sulting job to build a financial coaching
company. It dawned on him tha t he
could have a baby shower for his new
endeavor.
"It's a big shift for someone in their
30s to quit their job and restart their
life," said Mr. Singh, who lives in New
York. " It's probably one of the most mo-
mentous things you can do."
In November, long before he had in-
vestors, a public relations budget or a
stream of clients for the company he
called Ready.Steady.Money, Mr. Sing h
gathered about 30 friends at an outdoor
Italian restaura nt in Williamsburg, a
neighborhood in the borough of Brook-
lyn. Over pizza and beer, he explained
his vision a nd asked for support. The
event went so well he held another
shower in April on a rooftop in Williams-
burg, with gold balloons in the shape of
dolla r signs a nd many toasts.
"Some of my friends were like, 'Send
me your deck' or 'I know people who
would be g reat for it,' " he said. "I also
had a bout 15 frie nds sign up for the pro-
gram."
Across the United States, and espe-
cially in New York City, entrepreneurs
a re a ppropriating the baby shower, a n
event previously reserved for expecta nt
pare nts, usually mothers. The idea is
that if building a business is just as com-
prehe nsive (and expe nsive !) as having
a baby, why not build in the same kind of
communal support?
Some business showers include
games, decorations and catering. Some
founde rs eve n ask for gifts, providing
links to business registry websites that
have also become popular. Business
showers generally differ from la unch
pa rties because they occur a t the very
early stages of a sta rt-up, some times
Variant unlikely to kill recovery
But there are challenges
w ith supply and demand
for the U.S. economy
BY NEIL IRWIN
The good economic ne ws, whe n it comes
to the ascendant Delta varia nt of the co-
rona virus, is that it puts the U.S. econ-
omy a t risk in only two ways. The bad
news: They are supply and dema nd.
So far, the recovery in the United
States remains robust by most available
da ta. Real-time indicators of business
activity show little evidence that Ame ri-
cans a re pulling back their economic ac-
tivity in a ny meaningful way.
But while there is no reason to expect
a repeat of the huge disruption of 2020,
the new variant puts at risk the kind of
rapid recovery that has been underway
for months. Jus t as major parts of the
economy were fig uring out how to re-
turn to full functioning, this may a mount
to throwing sand in the gears.
The e me rgence of the variant has al-
ready caused several wobbly days on
Wall Street.
The chairma n of the Federal Reserve,
J e rome Powell, on Wednesday acknowl-
edged risks from the Delta varia nt, but
he suggested that any economic pull-
back it drove might not be as severe as
last year's. Still, he said, "it might weigh
on the return to the labor ma rket," not-
ing that the Fed will be monitoring tha t
"care fully."
At the White House, officials are mon-
itoring the va ria nt closely, but see no ev-
idence that it is hurting the recovery -
or tha t policymakers will need to inject
a nothe r dose of s hort-te rm fiscal stimu-
lus a nytime soon.
"Overall it looks like the ris ks are con-
side ra bly diminis hed compa red to the
height of the crisis ," said Kathy Bostja n-
cic, chief U.S. financial economist at Ox-
ford Economics. "But I do think you
have to worry about the macroeconomic
risks, a nd our experience over the last
18 months has shown that."
As economists a nd policymakers
game out the nature of those risks, wha t
stands out is not the chance of a major
shutdown. Instead, the concerns a re the
constraints on the availability of work-
ers and on the supply a nd demand for
many services.
On the supply side, there a re already
severe disr uptions in many s upply
chains, especially those tha t rely on
goods imported from Asia. T hese create
ripple effects for the United States, such
as a shortage of compute r chips tha t is in
turn hindering a utomobile production
a nd contributing to high inflation.
A more domestically focused supply-
side risk comes with the U.S. labor sup-
ply.
Employers have been complaining
about labor shortages, a nd if the re-
newed risk of illness ma kes even vacci-
nated adults reluctant to e nter or re-e n-
te r the work force, those shortages
could worsen.
Tha t is particularly true if schools
were to return to re mote learning -
when the business is still just gesta ting
as an idea.
"I would say the beauty of a bus iness
shower is it's kind of a new concept, and
it's kind of whatever you wa nt to ma ke of
it," said Dulma Altan, founder of Make-
lane, a maste r class for female founde rs.
It offers a free virtual kit called Startup
Stork to help people pla n business show-
ers. Over 1,300 have been dow nloaded in
2021.
Some invitees don't love the idea of
these "bus iness showe rs ." But investors
seem to. Having the wherewithal to
throw yourself a pa rty is a promising
sign.
"Investors appreciate someone who
has gone through the effort of being
scrappy and doing whatever it takes to
s ta rt your company,'' Ms. Alta n said. " It
shows you are resourceful. It shows you
can rally people a round your bra nd."
"Hopefully," Mr. Singh said, "it s hows
that I have a sense of humor a nd can
think a little bit more creatively around
traditional ideas of entre pre neurship."
Female founders, in particular, are at-
tracted to the idea of a business shower
because it helps them formally cele-
brate something that is not a life cycle
event.
"We are no longer living in a world
where the biggest milestones, espe-
cially for a woman, are getting married
a nd ha ving a baby," Ms . Alta n said. "We
are overdue to have the conversation
a bout how we cele brate women."
Indeed, Caitlin Kelly, 36, who lives in
New York City, was building her new
business, Vivid + Co, a company that is
using technology to help businesses
more effectively engage with the media,
when she found out she was pregnant.
"I re me mbe r whe n I first started
te lling people I was pregna nt, I had
never been cong ratula ted like this for
anything in my life," she said. "I know
people were coming from a place of love
and excitement, but for me, launching
the business was tha t for me."
Not wanting her to abandon celebrat-
ing one growing e ndeavor for a nothe r,
her mentor suggested she combine a
baby showe r with a pa rty for he r busi-
ness. Ms. Kelly had the invita tions read :
" It's just bus iness, baby."
"I don't want anyone in my compa ny
Downtown Boston in June. The Delta variant could play havoc on return-to-work plans.
even for brief periods - making it all the
ha rde r for pare nts to work.
"Wha t ha ppens if you have a flare-
up?" Ms. Bostjancic said. "Do you shut
school for a week? That's very dis rup-
tive to pare nts who want to return to the
labor force."
On the de ma nd side, the re is some
comfort in the seemingly robust spend-
ing from American consume rs, who a re
flush with accumula ted savings from
the pande mic, federal stimulus dollars
a nd rising wages.
The consumer confide nce index rose
s lightly in July, the Confe re nce Board
said Tuesday, suggesting tha t the emer-
gence of the varia nt has so far done no
major damage to consumers' willing-
ness to spend.
There is even a perverse twist tha t
could reduce the varia nt's impact on de-
ma nd for things like rest aurant meals
a nd conce rt tickets. The rate of infection
has remained relatively low in places
with high vaccination rates. In the
The variant has already caused
wobbly days on Wall Street.
places where infections are skyrocke t-
ing, public sentiment tends to be over-
whelmingly against a nything resem-
bling a lockdown.
Still, as noted by two Bank of America
economists, Ste phen Juneau and Anna
Zhou, Michigan saw a pullback in con-
s ume r spe nding on services during its
s urge of infections earlie r this year, even
a bsent formal restrictions on activity.
"So far we have seen little evidence of
the Delta variant significantly affecting
economic activity or spending on serv-
ices," they w rote in a rece nt research
note. "However, survey data point to in-
creased hesitancy of being in physical
locations a nd concerns over the virus."
Tha t could prove particularly rele-
vant in a few segments of the economy
that have been slowest to recove r from
the pande mic recession.
Many white-colla r e mployers have
Sid Singh, center, confused some people with his business shower invite. "Some people thought I was hosting a baby shower," he said.
to feel like my baby is a separate part of
my life that I don't want to s hare with
them," Ms. Kelly said. "People under-
sta nd that life is complex. Everybody
has a lot of stuff going on."
PI-IIUP KErrn FOR 11{[ NEW YORK TIMES
been on the verge of bringing wor ke rs
back to offices. If those pla ns change, of-
fices and downtown streets risk staying
e mptier for longer.
One particularly tricky thing is that
the solution to these potential economic
ripples lies in the public health a re na. If
the recove ry stalls, fiscal a nd monetary
policy a re unlikely to play much of a con-
structive role. Already, e nough money is
flowing through the economy to make
overheating a nd inflation a conce rn.
The re may be a de ma nd shortfall for
very specific things, like sandwiches
from a downtown restaurant or rooms in
a convention center hotel. But it is hard
to argue in the summer of 2021 that
the re is much risk of inadequate aggre-
gate de ma nd.
White House officials say vaccina-
tions over the pas t several months -
a nd strong support from the federal gov-
e rnme nt for people a nd businesses -
have set the foundation for the economy
to maintain momentum even as Delta
spreads. And they believe consume rs
will react differently this time to the
spreading virus.
In past waves, people who worried
a bout a higher r isk of contracting
Covid-19 could either assume tha t risk
a nd keep up their normal economic ac-
tivities, or pull back spending in places
like retail stores a nd restaurants. Now,
the officials say, spooked consume rs
have a third choice. The y can get vacci-
nated a nd largely maintain their typical
routines - or, if they're already vacci-
na ted, just keep spending the way they
have been.
All of that means tha t the policy re-
sponse to the Delta varia nt, as for Covid
all along, relies more heavily on getting
the best possible public health out-
comes, with conve ntional economic pol-
icy a secondary concern.
Just whe n it seemed that the pan-
de mic policy story was finally winding
down, in othe r words, it is starting to re-
peat itself.
Jim Tankersley a nd Jea nna Smialek con-
tributed reporting.
For other founders, having a business
shower is a much needed opportunity to
ask for gifts.
Thkisha Sanogo, 41, reme mbe rs how
helpful it was to receive presents before
Growing debate over spending
WASHINGTON
BY JIM TANKERSLEY
Republicans have made America ns'
concerns over rising prices their prima-
ry line of attack on P reside nt Biden's
economic age nda, seeking to derail tril-
lions of dollars in spe nding programs
a nd tax cuts by warning tha t they will
produce rocke ting 1970s-style infla tion.
They have seized on the increasing
costs of gasoline, used car s, a nd other
goods a nd services to accuse the presi-
dent of stoking "Bidenflation," fi rst with
the Sl.9 trillion stimulus bill he signed in
March a nd now with a proposed S3.5
trillion economic bill that Democrats
have begun to draft in the Senate.
The re are unusually large a mounts of
uncertainty over the pa th of infla tion in
the coming months, g iven the vagaries
a round resta rting a pa ndemic-stricke n
economy.
Yet e ven ma ny economists who worry
that high prices will linger longer tha n
a nalysts initially expected say there is
little reason to believe the proble m will
worsen if Mr. Eiden succeeds in his at-
tempts to bols ter child care, education,
paid leave, low-e mission energy and
more.
"There's been a lot of fear-mongering
concerning inflation," J oseph E. Stiglitz,
a liberal economist at Columbia Univer-
sity, said on Tuesday during a confer-
e nce call to support Mr. Biden's eco-
nomic plans. But the preside nt's spe nd-
ing proposals, he said , "are almost en-
tirely paid for."
The deba te over the effects of the pro-
posals "has nothing to do with the cur-
re nt a ngst over inflation," said Mark
Zandi, a Moody's Analytics economist
who has modeled Mr. Biden's pla ns.
Still, rising infla tion fears have forced
the president and his aides to s hift their
economic sales pitch to voters. The offi-
cials have stressed the pote ntial for his
efforts to lower the cost of health care,
housing, college a nd raising children,
even as they insist the cur re nt bout of
inflation is a tempora ry artifact of the
pandemic recession.
The administration's defe nse has at
times jumbled rapid price increases
with inflation-dampening efforts that
could ta ke years to bear fruit. And offi-
cials concede that the preside nt recently
overstated his case by claiming incor-
rectly that Mr. Zandi had found his poli-
cies would "reduce infla tion."
The economics of the inflation situa-
tion a re muddled : The United States has
little precede nt for the crimped supply
chains a nd padded consume r savings
that have emerged from the recession
a nd its aftermath, when la rge parts of
the economy shut down or pulled back
te mporarily a nd the federal govern-
me nt sent $5 trillion to people, bus i-
nesses a nd local gove rnments to help
weather the storm.
The economy re mains seven million
jobs short of its prepandemic total, but
e mployers are struggling to attract
workers at the wages they a re used to
paying.
BRIAN RNKE FOR THE NEW YORK l1Mf.S
the births of all three of her children,
now ages 9, 11 a nd 13. "You have so ma ny
decisions you have to make a nd things
you have to buy, it's overwhelming," s he
said. "But if you know your family a nd
But the political da nger for Mr. Biden,
and opportunity for Republicans who
have sought to derail his pla ns, is clear.
T he price inde x that the Federal Re-
serve uses to track inflation was up
nearly 4 percent in May from the previ-
ous year, its fas test inc rease since 2008.
Re publicans say it is self-evident tha t
more s pe nding would furthe r infla me
those inc reases - a new rationale for a
longstanding conservative a ttack on the
vast expansion of government pro-
grams th at Mr. Eide n is proposing .
Nine out of 10 respondents to a new
national poll for T he New York Times by
the online research firm Momentive,
which was previously known as Survey-
Monkey, say they have noticed prices
going up recently. Seven in 10 worry
those increases will persist "for a n ex-
te nded pe riod." Half of respondents say
tha t if the increases linger, they will pull
back on household spending to compen-
sate.
Adminjstration officials acknowledge
tha t infla tion worries are softening con-
sumer confide nce, including in the Uni-
versity of Michigan's survey of con-
sumer sentime nt, even as the economy
rebounds from recession with its strong-
est annual growth rate in decades.
T he issue has given Mr. Bide n's oppo-
nents their clearest a nd most consistent
message to attack an agenda tha t re-
mains popula r in public opinion polls.
"The re's no question we have serious
infla tion right now," Sena tor Patrick J.
Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania,
told CNN 's "State of the Union" on Sun-
day. "There is a question about how long
it lasts. And I'm jus t worr ied tha t the
r isk is hig h tha t this is going to be with
us for a w hile. And the Fed has put itself
in a position where it's going to be be-
hind the curve. You combine tha t with
massively excess s pending, a nd it is a
recipe for serious problems ."
Some Republica ns say a portion of Mr.
Biden's spe nding pla ns would not drive
up prices - a nd this week the Senate
agreed to take up a $1 trillion bipartisan
infrastruc ture bill that would invest in
roads, water pipes, broadband and
other physical infrastructure. But the
party is unified in criticizing the rest of
President Biden, center, at a Mack truck factory in Lower Macungie, Pa., on Wednesday.
Rising inflation fears have forced him to shift his economic pitch to voters.
BUSINESS
frie nds are there to support you, it
makes it easier."
So in 2019, whe n she launched My-
TAASK, an office management software
company, s he ha d an all-out baby
shower in a co-working space. There
was home made gumbo, games includ-
ing "guess the tagline of my compa ny"
a nd a maven of honor who helped deco-
rate the room in the company's colors.
There was also a gift registry.
Using Business Gift Registry, a web-
site started in 2019, Ms. Sa nogo, who
lives in New York City, registered for
ite ms s he needed for her start-up. She
received subscriptions for Cale ndly,
event scheduling software and gift
cards for office supplies. Others paid
registration fees for conferences she
hopes to atte nd, like the Atla nta Black
Tech Week, or contributed to the cost of
a irline ticke ts for meetings. " I got a bout
$10,000 worth of gifts,'' she said.
She a lso received $5,000 in cash gifts.
"I leveraged a nother $5,000 by going
back to investors with it a nd saying : ' I
was able to raise this amount of money
already. Do you mind s upporting us?'"
The Business Gift Registry has had 25
percent growth in the second quarter of
the year, said Zuley Cla rke, its founder,
who is also based in New York City. "It's
hard for founde rs to ask people for help,
but I a m seeing more people willing to
do it," she said.
Founders ta king this leap have faced
some opposition.
"Some people didn't get why I had a
registry for my business,'' Ms. Sanogo
said. "Some people saw it as a handout.
They believed I should be tough a nd
ta ke the burden on myself."
"To t hose people, I said , ' I would ap-
preciate you being ope n minded,'" she
said. " But I will say I got much more
warm reception than negative recep-
tion."
Mr. Singh received some confused re-
sponses . "Some people thought I was
hosting a baby shower for someone," he
said. "Others thought I was having a
ba by with someone."
He la ughed it off, but he did explain to
his frie nds why he was doing this. "Peo-
ple need to unde rsta nd I a m basically
committing my e ntire life to this," he
said. "I a m ta king the biggest r isk I can."
the president's proposals in a way that
ma ny economists say ignores how they
would actually affect the economy.
Some of the proposals would distrib-
ute money directly a nd quickly to Amer-
ican consume rs a nd workers - by rais-
ing wages for home health care worke rs,
for example, a nd continuing an ex-
pa nded tax credit that effectively func-
tions as a monthly stipend to all but the
highest-earning pa re nts. But they
would also raise ta xes on high earners,
a nd much of the spending would c reate
progra ms tha t would take time to find
their way into the economy, like paid
leave, universal prekindergarten a nd
free community college.
Some conservative economists worry
tha t the rela tively small slice of immedi-
a te payme nts would ris k furthe r heating
a n already hot economy, driving up
prices.
Republicans say the president's
plans will keep inflation rising,
but the White House says the
proposals could help tame costs.
The direct payments in the proposals
"would exacerbate pre-existing infla-
tiona ry pressures, put additional pres-
sure on the Fed to withdrawal monetary
policy support earlier than it had
planned, a nd put a t risk the longevity of
the recovery," said Michael R. Strain, an
economist a t the conservative Ameri-
can Enterprise Institute.
Othe r economists in a nd outside the
administration say those effects would
be swamped by the potential of the
spending programs like paid leave to re-
duce inflationary pressure.
"The economics of these investme nts
strongly belies the Republican critique,"
Jared Bernstein, a me mber of Mr. Bi-
den's Council of Economic Advisers,
said in a n interview, "because these are
investments that will yield faster pro-
ductivity growth, greater labor supply,
the expansion of the economy's supply
side - which very clearly da mpe ns in-
fla tionary pressures, not exacerba tes
the m."
KENNY HOL5TON FOR lllE NEW YORK TIMES
Opinion
You shouldn't have to be a citizen to vote
Giving the Atossa Araxia Abrahamian
franchise to
noncitizens
wouldn't just Washingtonia ns love to complain
be fair, it about taxation without representation.
But for me and my fellow noncitizens,
would it is a fact of political life that we s ub-
improve mit to unquestioningly year after year,
America. primary after pr imar y, presidential
election after presidential election.
Nearly 15 million people living legally
in the United States, most of whom
contribute as much as any natural-
born America n to this country's civ ic,
cultural and economic life, don't have a
s ay in matters of politics and policy
because we - resident foreign nation-
als, or "aliens" as we are sometimes
called - ca nnot vote.
Considering the Supreme Court's
recent decis ion undermining voting
rights, and Republicans' efforts to
suppress, redistrict and manipulate
their way to e lectoral security, it's time
for Democrats to radically expand the
ele ctorate. Propos ing federal legis la-
tion to give millions of young people
a nd essentia l workers a clea r road to
citizenship is a good start. But there's
a nother meas ure tha t lawmakers both
in Washington a nd state capitals
should put in place : lifting voting
restrictions on legal residents who
a ren't citizens - people with gree n
ca rds, people here on work visas, a nd
those who a rrived in the country as
childre n a nd are s till waiting for per-
manent pape rs.
Expanding the franchise in this way
would give American de mocracy new
life, restore imm igrants' trus t in gov-
ernment a nd send a powerful message
of inclusion to the rest of the world .
It's easy to assume that restricting
the fra nchise to citize ns is a n age-old,
nonnegotiable fact. But it's a ctually a
re latively recent conve ntion and a
political choice. Early in the United
States' history, voting was a fun ction
not of nationa l citizenship but of gen-
der, race and class. As a res ult, white
male landowners of a ll nationalities
were e ncouraged to play a n active role
in shaping American democracy, while
women and poor, Indigenous and
enslaved people could not. That w hole-
sale discrimina tion is unques tionably
worse tha n excluding reside nt fore ign-
e rs from the polls, but the point is tha t
history shows how read ily voting laws
ca n be alte re d - a nd that restrictive
ones te nd not to age well.
Another misconception is tha t citi-
zen voting rights have a lways been the
prerogative of the federal government.
In fact, sta tes have la rgely de cided
who had a say in local, s ta te and na-
tional e lections. Arka nsas was the last
state to eliminate noncitizen voting in
1926, a nd it wasn't until 1996 tha t
Congress doubled down with the Ille- say in who gets elected to their state a sense of investment in the ir towns, de nts provide proof of voter regis tra- but haven't once ha d a c ha nce to cast
gal Immigration Reform a nd Immi- legislature, Congress or the White cities, communities and country. tion as a requireme nt for naturaliza- a ballot here. Last fall, I grew so
g rant Responsibility Act, which made House? The re's a detachme nt tha t comes with tion, rathe r tha n t he other way a round. frustrated tha t I s ta rted mailing
voting in federal e lections while for- What 's more, allowing noncitizens to not be ing a ble to vote in the place We will have more tha n "earne d" it. ballots to my hometown in Switzer-
e ign - already not pe rmitted because vote in fede ra l, sta te a nd municipal whe re you live. Concerns about mixed And wha t bette r way to learn a bout la nd. But voting in a place I haven't
of state -level rules - a criminal, a nd elections would help revitalize Ame ri- loyalties, meanwhile, a re misplaced. Ame rican life tha n to play an active lived in since I was a minor ma kes
de portable, offe nse. (This means that can de mocracy at a time whe n e nthusi- The United States not only a llows dua l role in deciding its elections? about as little sense as not voting in
congressiona l De mocrats working on asm a nd trus t a re lacking. While 2020 citizenship but a lso allows dual citi- In the absence of federal- or sta te- the city whe re I've lived my e ntire
immigration and election reform can was conside red a "high turnout" elec- zens to vote - a nd from abroa d. Is level action, local lawmakers a r e a l- adult life.
reverse the 1996 sanctions the same tion, only about 65 percent of eligible there a ny reason to think resident ready free le t noncitizens decide on I'm looking forward to City Council
way they voted the m in.) vote rs cast ba llots. Compare that to foreigne rs should be less represente d? things like garbage pickup, parking giving me, a nd the other m illion or so
The s trongest case for noncitizen Germa ny, where turnout was 76 per- Voting is, in a sense, a reward for rules a nd potholes. Some do. Since friendly a liens living he re, the right to
voting today is re presenta tion : The cent in the last general election. becoming a n Ame rica n. But in truth, 1992, Takoma Park, Md., has a llowed vote for New York's offi cials. But we
more voters show up to the polls, the De mocrats are likely to be the big- it's ofte n much ha rder to get a visa or a ll residents to vote, rega rdless of their should be able to vote for our repre-
more accurately e lections reflect peo- gest beneficiaries of this change - at green card than to the n become a citizenship. Nine a dditional Ma ryla nd senta tives in Washington, too. I ho pe
ples' desires. The United Sta tes al- least a t first. But it could have interest- na tura lized citizen. It took me 15 years tow ns, as well as dis tricts in Ve rmont tha t De mocrats seize the ir cha nce,
ready has ple nty of ins titutions that ing ripple effects: Elected Republicans a nd over $10,000 in legal fees (not to a nd Massachusetts, have voted to and realize the powe r and the enthu-
account for noncitize ns: The cens us might be induced to a ppeal to a more mention the cost of college) to obta in re-e nfranchise noncitizens. The c ities siasm of their pote ntial constituents.
a ims to reach a ll reside nts because it diverse constituency, or perha ps to pe rma nent residency. The citizens hip of Chicago, Washington a nd Portla nd They - a nd we - will not regret it.
believes everyone, even alie ns, ma t- e nthuse the ir cons titue nts so deeply test a nd oath feel compa ratively like a are also considering the idea, a nd a bill
ters. Corporations enjoy free speech tha t they too s ta rt to vote in g reate r piece of cake. that would give New York City 's a utho- ATOSSA ARAXIA ABRAHAMIAN is the author
and legal pe rsonhood - and they're numbers. It shouldn't be this one rous to emi- r ized immigra nts voting rights has a of "The Cosmopolites: The Coming
not even people. Would it be s uch a It's also jus t good civics: Allowing gra te. But given tha t it is, it would new supermajority in t he City Council. Global Citizen." She is wor king on a
st retch to give a noncitizen reside nt a people to vote gives the m even more of ma ke much more sense to make resi- I've lived in Ne w York s in ce 2004, second book about weird jur isdictions.

We're Ben and Jerry. Men of ice cream, Men of principle.

We support Bennett Cohen
the compa- Jerry Greenfield
ny's decision
to end the
sale of its ice We are the founders of Ben & Jerry's.
We a re also proud Jews. It's part of
cream in the who we are a nd how we've identified
occupied ourselves for our whole lives. As our
Palestinian compa ny began to exp a nd interna tion-
ally, Is rael was one of our firs t overse as
territories. marke ts . We were then , and rema in
today, s upporters of the Sta te of Is rael.
But it 's possible to support Israel a nd
oppose some of its polic ies, just as
we've opposed policies of the U.S.
gove rnment. As s uch, we unequivo-
cally support the decision of t he com-
pa ny to end bus iness in the occupied
te rritories, w hich t he international
community, including t he United Na-
tions, has deemed an illegal occupa -
tion.
While we no longer have a ny opera-
tional control of the compa ny we
foun ded in 1978, we're proud of its
action a nd believe it is on the right side
of his tory. In our view, e nding the sales
of ice cream in the occupied territories
is one of the most importa nt decis ions
the com pany has made in its 43-year
his tory. It was es pecia lly brave of the
company. Even though it undoubtedly
knew that the response would be swift
a nd powerful, Ben & Jerry's took the
ste p to a lign its bus iness and opera-
tions with its progressive values.
Tha t we s upport the compa ny's
decision is not a contradiction nor is it
a nti-Semitic. In fact, we believe this act
can a nd should be seen as advancing
the concepts of jus tice a nd huma n
rig hts, core tenets of Judaism.
Be n & Jerry's is a compa ny tha t
advocates peace. It has long called on
Congress to reduce the U.S. milita r y
budget. Be n & J er ry's opposed the
Pe rsia n Gulf war of 1991. But it wasn't
jus t talk. One of our very fi rst social-
mission initiatives, in 1988, was to
introduce t he Peace Pop. It was part of
a n e ffort to promote the idea of re-
directing I perce nt of na tional defense
budgets around the world to fund
peace-promoting activities. We see the
company's recent action as p a rt of a
simila r trajectory - not as a nti-Isr ael,
but as part of a long history of being
pro-peace.
In its stateme nt, the compa ny drew
a contrast between the de mocratic
ter ritory of Is rael a nd the territories
Israel occupies. The decis ion to halt
sa les outside Israel's de mocratic bor-
ders is not a boycott of Is rael. The Ben
& J er ry's sta te ment did not endorse
the Boycott, Divestme nt and Sanctions
moveme nt.
T he company's stated decis ion to
more fu lly a lig n its operations with its
values is not a rejection of Is rael. It is a
rejection of Isr aeli policy, which per-
EM\IANUEL DUNAND/4CENCE FRANCE.PRE$[. VIA GETTY IMAGES
petuates an illegal occupation t ha t is a
ba rrie r to peace a nd violates the basic
huma n rights of the Pa lestinia n people
w ho live under the occupa tion. As
J ewish supporters of t he Sta te of Is-
rael, we fundame nta lly reject the
notion that it is anti-Semitic to ques-
tion the policies of the Sta te of Is rael.
When we left t he helm of the com-
pany, we s igned a unique governa nce
structure in the acquisition agreeme nt
with Unilever back in 2000. T ha t s truc-
ture is the magic behind both Ben &
Je rry's continued indepe nde nce and its
success. As pa rt of the agreement, the
com pany reta ined a n indepe ndent
board of directors with a responsibility
to protect the compa ny's esse ntial
bra nd integrity and to pursue its sociaJ
miss ion.
We believe business is a mong the
most powerful entities in society. We
be lieve that companies have a res pon-
sibility to use their power and influ-
e nce to a dvance the wide r common
good. Over the years, we've also come
to believe tha t t here is a spiritua l
aspect to business, just as there is to
the lives of individua ls. As you give,
you receive. We hope that for Ben &
Jerry's, that is a t the heart of t he busi-
ness. To us, tha t's what t his decision
represents, a nd that is w hy we a re
proud tha t 43 years a fter sta rting a n
ice cream shop in a dila pidated gas
sta tion in Burlington, Vt., our na mes
are still on the package.
BENNETT COHEN and JERRY GREENFIELD
founded Ben & Jerry's Homemade
Holdings in 1978.

tttbt Nt'W ffork tttintes
INTER NATI ONAL EDITION
A.G. SUlZBERCER, Publisher
DEAN BAQUET, Executioe Editor
JOSEPH KAHN, Mannging Editor
TOM BODKIN, Creative Du-ector
SUZANNE DALEY, Associate Editor
KATHI..EE.N KINGSBURY, Opinion F.dilor
PATRICK HEALY, Deputy OJ)fflion Edilor
Mississippi explains all,
once again, on abortion
Linda Greenhouse
Contributing Writer
Attorney General Lynn Fitch of Mis-
sissippi made nationwide news last
week w hen she asked the Supreme
Court to over turn its two leading
precedents on the right to abortion,
Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood
v. Casey. I was puzzled by the treat-
ment of this filing as news, unless the
news was that a state finally came
clea n with the court a nd told the
justices what it really wanted the m to
do.
After all, back in May, when the
court agreed to hea r Mississippi's
appeal of a decis ion tha t struck down
its ban on a bortion a t 15 weeks of
pregnancy, it was per fectly obvious
that if Mississippi's Gesta tional Age
Act we re to be upheld, the two prece-
de nts would have to go. That's be-
cause a fe tus at 15 weeks is a t least
two months shy of via bility, a nd both
Roe a nd Casey give women a n ab so-
lute right to ter minate a pregna ncy
before the fetus is viable. T he 1992
Casey decision authorized states to
place a n onerous a nd expensive ob-
stacle course in a woma n's path, but
nonetheless, the ultimate decision to
te rminate a pregnancy before fetal
viability re mained he rs to ma ke.
Pe rmitting a
sta te to ba n a bor-
The state's
tion at 15 weeks -
attorney or at six, as in
general is
Texas, or at just
asking the about any old
U.S. Supreme time, as in a new
Court to Arka nsas law,
overturn te mpora rily
Roev. Wade . blocked last week
by a federal dis-
trict judge, tha t
purports to ban
nearly all a bortions - is inconsiste nt
with nearly 50 years of Supre me
Court jurisprude nce.
In the Supreme Court petition
Attorne y General Fitch filed in June
2020 (tha t is not a typog raphical
e r ror; it took the justices 11 months
simply to decide to hear the case),
she was coy about wha t she was
really asking . "To be clear," s he told
the court, "the questions presented in
this pe tition do not require the court
to overturn Roe or Casey." She did
concede, but only in a footnote, tha t
the case might prompt a more conclu-
sive outcome: " If the court deter-
mines that it cannot reconcile Roe
a nd Casey with other precedents or
scientific advanceme nts showing a
compelling state inte rest in fetal life
far earlier in pregna ncy tha n those
cases conte mpla te, the court should
not re tain e rroneous precede nt."
The tone is comple tely differe nt in
the sta te's brief on the merits, filed
last week in adva nce of the a rgument
the court will hold this fall. "Roe and
Casey a re egregiously wrong," Ms.
Fitch asserts. T he case for overturn-
ing them is "overwhelming." The two
precede nts have not only "proven
hopelessly unworkable," but "have
da maged the de mocra tic process,
poisoned our na tional discourse,
ltOGEIJOV.SQUSIASSOCIAllDPRf.SS
An anti-abortion counselor outside the
Jackson Women's Health Organization in
Jackson, Miss.
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Raspa ii 9 3 120 La Cournewe
MEREDrrn KOPIT LEVIEN, Chief &ecutit.>e Ofrw:er
STEPHEN DUNBAR.JOHNSON, President, I nternational
HELEN KONSTANTOPOULOS, V.P.,lnternatiorw/Cirrulotion
HELENA PHUA, Encutive V.P., A sin-PaciI'ic
SUZANNE YVERNts, lnternotiono/ Chid Financiol Officer
plagued the law - and, in doing so,
ha rmed this court."
What might account for such a dra-
ma tic change in Mississippi's state-
ments? One reason that jumps to mind
is that the court that will d ecide this
case is not the court Attorney General
Fitch needed to pe rsuade when she
first approached it last summer.
There's little doubt Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg's death last Septe mbe r a nd
he r replacement by Justice Amy Coney
Barre tt has flipped the court on a bor-
tion, at least to some exte nt. It's ha rd
to re me mbe r that it was only last
s ummer tha t Chief Justice John Rob-
e rts added his vote to those of wha t
were then four liberal justices to s trike
down Louisiana's law requiring hospi-
tal admitting privileges for doctors
who pe rform abortions. If the re was a
strategic reason to mince words in a
pe tition filed the n, the re is none now.
Granting all that, I have a diffe re nt
ta ke on Mississippi's brief. I don't
actually read it as a conve ntional legal
document, if the definition of such a
document is a piece of writing inte nded
to pers uade a court. T hose Supreme
Court justices who have lived their
adult lives in opposition to Roe v. Wade
ha rdly need to be informed by a sta te
attorney general that the case was
wrongly decided . The brief is a political
docume nt intended for political con-
s umption.
Lynn Fitch , 59, is the first woma n to
be Mississippi's a ttorney ge neral a nd
the firs t Re publican to hold the office
s ince Reconstruction. She is a n ambi-
tious politician sometimes mentioned
as a futu re governor. T here's nothing
to apologize for in that ; I have never
known a state a ttorney general who
wasn't aiming for highe r office. But it's
ha rd to escape the feeling that she
intends Dobbs v. J ackson Wome n's
Health Orga niza tion to cata pult he r
into the state house.
Two years ago, as sta te treasure r,
s he won the Republican nomination for
a ttorney gene ral in a three-way prima-
ry in which the main issue was which
of the candidates could claim to be the
most conservative.
"I'm a n or iginal Trump supporte r,"
Ms. Fitch proclaimed on the stump. "I
have a relationship with our president,
a nd you can count on me to work with
our preside nt to stand s trong, to fight
illegal immigration, build tha t wall and
also to s top the assault on our Chris-
tia n values."
I don't know, but can only suspec t
that she took some afte r-the-fact heat
at home for not having made a more
full-throated call to overturn Roe in he r
initial Supreme Court petition.
With Mississippi's card s now on the
ta ble, the question is whethe r the
sta te's brief ma kes it more likely that
the court will actually overturn Roe
and Casey. While alarmed responses to
the brief from leading abortion-rights
organizations suggested that the a n-
swer should be yes, I have a diffe re nt
view. Chief J ustice Robe rt s has often
seemed attracted to what some schol-
a rs call "stealth overruling" - deci-
sions that undermine a precede nt to
the point of collapse without actually
pushing it over the edge. (Justice
Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016, used
to taunt the chief justice for engaging
in wha t he scathingly la be led "faux
judicial modesty."
What Mississippi's brief has done is
ma ke it impossible for the court to
place a ny kind of fig leaf over a ruling
in the state's favor. To uphold a pre-
viability abortion ban is to overturn
Roe v. Wade a nd Planned Parenthood
v. Casey. It's that s imple. And for once,
a sta te is saying yes, tha t's exactly
what it wants.
Does tha t mean the court is less
likely to ta ke that step? I'm under no
illusions. The court will do what it will
do, which is to say whatever it has five
votes for. But at least there is now a
better cha nce that the public will un-
de rsta nd wha t that is.
LINDA GREENHOUSE, a winner of the 1998
Pulitzer Prize, writes about the Su-
preme Court and the law. She reported
on the Supreme Court f or The Times
from 1978 to 2008, and is the a uthor of
the forthcoming "Justice on the Brink :
T he Death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the
Rise of Amy Coney Barrett, and Twelve
Months That Transformed the Supreme
Court."
se' is back
Charles M. Blow
If this phony "de bate" over the obscure
concept of critical race theory caught
you off g uard a nd unawa re, you a re not
alone. But it is apparently part of a
Re publican political strategy to ma ke
race - or more precisely, the denial of
Amer ica n racism - a central (and
winning) political issue for Re publi-
cans.
As Da vid Siders repor ted Wednes-
day in Politico, the mantra "America is
not a racist country" is eme rging as
"an early plank of the 2024 G.0.P.
contest."
As Sider s put it:
Top D emocrats, including President
JoeB iden and Vice President Kamala
Ha rris, hauesaid publicly they don't
believe A merica isa racist cou ntry. But
Republicans are hoping to portray the
party as out ofstep with the thinking of
mainstream America. A nd by
attempting to ha mess lightning-rod
issues such as critical race theory and
"defundthepolice,"the G.O.P. is
signaling race will again be at the
centerofthe2024 cam paign.
America's eviction crisis has arrived
Serna K. Sgaier
Aaron Dibner-Dunlap
Alongside the prospect of a new surge in
coronavirus infections, a nothe r crisis is
on the horizon in Ame rica: A na tionwide
wave of evictions threatens more tha n
six million families that have falle n
be hind on re nt.
The true extent of the threat has been
masked by a national moratorium on
evictions. But tha t ban will expire on
Saturday, allowing landlords to sta r t or
continue eviction proceedings in most
states.
This proble m is especially acute in
250 counties whe re at least one-fifth of
rente rs are behind, according to our
a nalysis . But nationwide, the sheer
scale of rent debt is alarming : An esti-
mated S23 billion in all is outstanding,
with about $3,800 per average house-
hold in arrears.
Sta te a nd local gove rnme nts can
prevent this rental crisis from becoming
a homelessness cr isis with help from
nearly S50 billion in federal Emergency
Re ntal Assista nce funds. Ye t despite
la uda ble coordina tion efforts a nd recent
acceleration, the rollout is too slow, too
few re nter s are eligible, a nd the a pplica-
tion process is too complicated. As a
result, funds are reaching only a s mall
fraction of those who need the m most.
For example, $158 million has been
disbursed in California, w hile over S1
billion was a pplied for. South Carolina is
faring worse: under $1 million has been
disbursed, out of $39 million requested.
Distributing direct aid this way is ne w to
ma ny governme nts and every locality
has a unique housing la ndscape. But
with the mora torium e nding in just
days, they have run out of time.
The re is also a huge eligibility gap :
We estimate that of the 6.2 million
We could go through how Republi-
cans a re using a fau x ca mpaign against
critical race theory to prevent the accu-
rate teaching of history, or how it is
unmista kable that Ame rica is a racist
country a nd that doesn't require most
individual Amer ica ns to be consciously
racist, a nd how "defund the police" is a
completely logical proposal that, in
most cases, is not about abolition of the
police force but the reallocation of funds
from the police to social services. But
there is no use or need.
This is not a debate about facts, this is
a de bate about na rra tives. This is a
" Lost Cause" redux. Whe n the South
lost the Civil Wa r, revisionists there
invented the propaganda na r rative of
the "Lost Cause;' positing that the light
had been honorable and righteous and
not about maintaining slavery but
maintaining a superior way of life. In
this na rrative, slavery had been good
a nd the e nslaved treated rela tively well,
with many of the e nslaved ha ppy work-
e rs.
As Ty Seidule, professor e meritus of
history a t West Point, wrote in " Robe rt
E. Lee a nd Me: A Southe rner 's Reckon-
ing with the Myth of the Lost Cause,"
"The Lost Ca use created a flawed mem-
ory of the Civil War, a lie that formed the
ideological founda tion for white su-
premacy and J im Crow laws, which
used violent terror a nd de jure segrega-
tion to e nforce racial control."
We a re in the midst of a nother Lost
Cause mome nt. Conservatives in the
United States lost a ba ttle in the racial
households in arrears, half ma ke more
money than the federal progra m al-
lows and therefore are n't eligible. The
result is tha t at-risk households in
nearly every county are still cata-
strophically behind.
Our a nalysis was based on the Cen-
sus Bureau's Household Pulse Survey,
from which we were able to estima te
e very renting household's likelihood of
being behind on re nt.
We found that in the 84 largest urba n
counties, including Philadelphia, St.
Louis a nd Dallas, re nte rs face a col-
lective $13 billion bill. Also worrying
a re counties across the Deep South. In
several counties in South Carolina and
Mississippi, for example, more tha n
one in four renters are be hind. The re
a re also millions of households at r isk
in small counties. In Columbia County,
Ga ., north of Augusta, we estimate
1,200 households owe a collective S4.6
million.
The numbe rs in large urba n a reas
a re staggering. Nearly 300,000 rente rs
owe a n average of $5,300 each in Los
OPINION
* * **
* *
wa r after the publication of The 1619 Boone a nd J ohnny Appleseed .
Project by The Times and after the It is the industrial revolutionists, the
historic protests tha t engulfed the Wright brother s a nd He nry Ford. It is
country and the world in the wake of the "The Waltons;' Andy Griffith, "Leave It
murder of George Floyd. to Beave r " and "The Dukes of Hazzard."
I'm not sure tha t I would call it a racial It is the race to the moon, nuclear power
reckoning, but it was definitely a racial a nd the invention of the internet.
rous ing. The Amer ican na rrative that we ha ve
Amer ica seemed willing to at least built is mostly about the valor, brillia nce
adjust the na r rative about the country, and dete rmination of white people.
how it was born a nd how it grew, who La rgely absent from it is all of the pain,
belongs a nd to whom a debt is due. But oppression and death that are woven
to ma ny, this was the into tha t story.
Many Amer• grea test of threats. Absent is the ensla vement, the mas-
The ability and sacres a nd lynchings. Absent a re the
icans like the a uthority to create broken treaties, the inte rnment camps
sanitized narra tive - or to a nd racial exclusion laws. Absent are
version of challe nge or cha nge the Black Codes, J im Crow and mass
their history it - is an a wesome in ca rcera tion.
- color- power. Some may But many Americans like the sani-
corrected and call it a soft power, tized version of their history - color-
Photoshopped but I say soft like the corrected a nd Photoshopped - a nd
- and always cloud that unleashes alwa ys have.
the tornado. Altering tha t narra tive, cor recting it,
ha ve.
Stories have the filling it out with the uncomfortable bits,
power to profoundly with the truth, is an affront to the very
move people, to idea of America as they have come to
create societal fra meworks a nd the conceive it. In their view, including
pretext for war and peace. The world's America's hor rors defiles America's
greatest relig ions follow books that a re he roes.
essentially collections of stories. So Republicans are on a political
It is the story a nd the ideal that create crusade to protect lore a nd lies. They
the Amer ican story a nd the American know that many America ns, many of
identity. The brave pilgrims who the m their voters, will take a lie over
crossed the ocean and esta blished guilt and atoneme nt, every day of the
thriving settle ments, against all odds in week. Many are lost causes in the mo-
a hostile new world. The noble a nd rass of political tribalism, which makes
indepe ndent cowboy who pushes west. the m all the more open to Lost Cause
Lewis a nd Cla rk, Pa ul Bunyan, Da niel propaganda.
It should be much eas ie r for families
to get access to prog rams tha t can help
the m pay their rent. In addition, states
and localities should invest 10 percent of
their federal funds in eviction diversion
programs, such as legal aid and media-
tion ; these programs could help people
who don't qualify for Emergency Rental
Assistance because their incomes are
too high.
States a nd localities can extend their
ow n eme rgency eviction moratoriums ,
increase awareness of tenant rights,
a nd allow a rrears to be converted to
civil debt, for which a te na nt can't be
evicted, while households are waiting
for their federal re nt assistance. Seek-
ing out vulnerable re nte r s is key: Wash-
ington State, for example, focuses on
historically marginalized groups, while
l£AHM!UJSIRWrutS Houston uses the Cente rs for Disease
Control's Social Vulnerability Index to
Angeles County. In New York City, over direct its outreach. Othe r counties
400,000 renter s owe a collective $2 should do the same, using the C.D.C.
billion. Chicago, Dallas , Houston, Mi- index or our own organization's tool, the
a mi-Dade , P hiladelphia, Phoe nix a nd Covid-19 Community Vulne rability
San Diego all show at least 55,000 fam- Index.
ilies at ris k of eviction for nonpayment. If state and local governme nts fail to
T his crisis also underscores existing act quickly after the morator ium is
inequities in Ame rica. Those who've lost lifted, the n local leaders a nd concerned
employme nt in- neighbors must be prepared to help
Evictions are come in the pa n- families through the eviction process. A
de mic face three good resource to start with is the Evic-
returning, and
times greater odds tion Lab, a research program that has
more than six tha t they are in published a useful directory of over 600
million h ouse- arrears. According organizations tha t can help those facing
holds are be- to our a nalysis, eviction.
hind on r ent. being Black means Now that we know whe re the most
you a re a pproxi- re nters a re in trouble, we have the tools
mately twice as we need to p revent a ne w kind of pa n-
likely to be behind on rent, even after demic. Families who fell behind on re nt
accounting for differences in education, don't have time to wait.
employm ent, living situation and other
factors. H ispanic a nd As ia n families a re SEMA K. SGAIER is a co-founder a nd the
also conside ra bly more likely to have chief executive of Surgo Ventures and
falle n behind than white families (about an adjunct assistant prof essor at the
10 percen t of white households owe back Harvard T.H. Chan School of P ublic
rent). Health. AARON DIBNER-DUNLAP is a senior
T his is a preventable crisis. research scientist at Surgo Ventures.
OPINION
The unvaccinated define the limits of persuasion
KLEIN, FROM PAGE I
refuse to get vaccinated, 9 percent
said they would get a shot only "if
required," and 39 percent wanted to
"wait a nd see."
Six months later, Kaiser asked the
same question. By the n, most of the
wai t-and-see crowd had seen enough
to get vaccinated. The only-if-required
crew shrank, but only by a bit: 6
percent of Americans were still wait-
ing on a mandate. But the definitely-
notters had barely budged: They
numbered 15 percent in December
a nd 14 percent in J une.
I don't want to overstate my case.
There was movement between
groups. Some people who said they
would definitely refuse a vaccine in
December had gotten one by June.
About a quar ter of those who intended
to watch a nd wait decided firmly
against getting vaccinated. But the
surprise in Kaiser's data is the consis-
tency of people's views. In Dece mber,
73 percent of American adults said
they were eager to get vaccinated or
were at least open to the possibility.
Today, 69 percent of Americans over
the age of 18 have gotten at least one
shot. "Most vaccine behaviors match
what people planned to do six months
ago," Kaiser concluded.
With Delta supercharging transmis-
sion a mong the unvaccinated, the
debate now is how to persuade them
to get a shot (or two). I'm sympathetic
to most of the ideas people have of-
fered. The ED.A. should give the
vaccines full approval, not just e mer-
gency authorization, as the agency's
absurd process has created mass
confusion a nd fed mistrust. We should
respect people's concerns and their
intelligence. We should admit that the
medical system has failed many of us
before, a nd treated Black Americans
with particular callousness. We should
be honest that many are making a risk
calcula tion for themselves, rather
than indulging a conspiracy theory.
We should support leading Republi-
cans who a re trying to ease the ba rri-
ers of partisan identity. If Sarah Huck-
abee Sanders wants to call it "the
Trump vaccine" a nd sell shots as a
way of sticking it to the media and the
Democrats and Anthony Fa uci, I wish
her the bes t.
We should also, of course, do every-
thing we can to make vaccination
frictionless. It's easy to get a shot in a
big city, but many people still live far
from medical providers and cut off
The
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from the internet. Others lack trans-
porta tion, or ha ve jobs that make it
ha rd to take a day off to recover from
the fluish side effects, or h ave physical
or mental impairments that make
treatme nt difficult.
But I suspect all of this will change a
depressingly modest numbe r of minds .
There a re no speeches more powerful
than the fear of disease and the grief of
loss. That's evident in the vaccination
data now. Delta does a ppear to be
driving a s urge in vaccinations. But is
this really our strategy ? More death
will lead to more shots in a rms? One of
the most heartbreaking stories I've
read lately came from a Facebook post
by Brytney Cobia, a doctor in Ala-
bama. She wrote:
<iibc~c\lJ ifork <!times
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Event Content Partner
Kite Insights
I've made a LOT of progress
encouraging people to get vaccinated
lately!!! Do you want to know how?
I'm admitting young healthy people to
the hospital with very serious Covid
infections. One of the last things they
do before they're intubated is beg me
for the vaccine. I hold their hand and
tell them that I'm sorry, but it's too late.
A few days later when I call time o f
death, I hug their Family members and
I tell them the best way to honor their
loved one is to go get vaccinated and
encourage everyone they know to do
the same. They cry. And they tell me
they didn't know. They thought it was
a hoax. They thought it was political.
They thought because they had a
certain blood type or a certain skin
color they wouldn't get as sick. They
thought it was ''just the flu." But they
were wrong. And they wish they
could go back. But they can't. So they
thank me and they go get the vaccine.
Phil Vale ntine, a conservative radio
host in Nashville who said he would-
n't get vaccinated a nd made parody
songs about "the Vaxma n," caught the
virus, and his condition quickly
turned critical. He's now in the hospi-
tal, on a ventilator. "He regrets not
being more vehemently 'pro-vaccine,'
a nd looks forward to being able to
more vigorously advocate that posi-
tion as soon as he is back on the air,"
his radio station said in a statement.
This is one problem with trusting
our rationality: The choice we make
now, before we catch the virus, may
not be the choice we will wish we had
made once we get sick. Then there's
the stubborn fact that individual
decisions have collective conse-
que nces . It may indeed be the ca se
that a healthy 19-year-old American
has little to fear from the coronavirus.
But his immunosuppressed grandfa-
ther has much to fear from him.
Whether it is a more severe imposi-
tion on liberty to ask someone to get
vaccina ted or regularly tested than to
ask all immunosuppressed people in
the country to effectively shelter in
place for the rest of their lives is a
collective ques tion that demands a
collective a nswer.
Many countries a re offe ring that
a nswer, and seeing results. Emman-
uel Macron, the president of Fra nce,
proposed a law requiring either proof
of vaccination or a negative test result
for many indoor activities. The mere
prospect of a vaccine mandate set off
mass protests. It also led to a surge in
vaccinations. On J uly 1, 50.8 percent
of the French population had gotten
at least one shot - putting France 3.5
points behind America. By Sunday,
59.1 percent of France had been at
least partially vaccinated, putting it
2.7 points a head of the United States.
A numbe r of American employers
are following suit. On Thursday, the
Biden administration was expected to
a nnounce a directive requiring all
civilian federal workers to get vacci-
nated or face routine testing a nd
restrictions . California and New York
will require proof of vaccina tion or
routine negative test results for all
state e mployees. New York City is
imposing the same requirement for
its public employees . Around 600
Disinformation comes from the top, too
Bret Stephens
Who are the most dangerous purvey-
ors of Covid misinformation?
This spring, the Center for Counte r-
ing Digital Hate published "The Disin-
formation Dozen" - a re port on the 12
influencers it claimed were responsible
for 65 pe rcent of a nti-vaccine false-
hoods disseminated on Facebook and
other social media pla tforms. Top of
the list is Florida osteopath Joseph
Mercola, the s ubject of a recent profile
in The Times by my colleague Sheera
Fre nkel. Othe r disinformers include
Robert F. Ke nnedy Jr., the e nvironmen-
tal activist, a nd Rizza Isla m, a Nation
of Isla m acolyte.
The misinformation Mercola, Ke n-
nedy a nd the others peddle is ugly
stuff, a danger to the health of those
who believe it as well as a public haz-
a rd to those they expose to their irre-
sponsible choices. It's also a reminder
that today's anti-vaxxer s a re n't merely
a right-wing phe nomenon, much as
some of the media have tried to paint it
that way. Most figures on the list come
from the woo-woo world of alternative
medicine, not us ually associated with
rock-ribbed Re publicanism.
But the story of cha rla tans peddling
fake cures and political conspiracy
theories isn't the only part of the Covid
misinforma tion saga. Dis trust in pub-
lic-health messaging is also sown whe n
public-health messenge rs show the m-
selves to be less tha n completely trust-
worthy.
The la test set-to in this drama was a
July 20 screaming ma tch be tween Dr.
Anthony Fauci a nd Se na tor Ra nd Paul.
The Kentucky Republican suggested
that Fauci had lied to Congress in
claiming that the National Institutes of
Health had never funded gain-of-
function research at the Wuha n Insti-
tute of Virology. Fauci took veheme nt
exception, saying the research that the
N.I.H. had funded indirectly with a
S600,000 grant wasn't connected to the
Covid virus and didn't qualify as gain-
of-function, a research technique in
which a pathogen is made more trans-
missible.
Fauci is almost certainly right on the
technical me rits, a nd Pa ul didn't help
his case with his ] 'accuse a ntics.
But the la rger truth - obscured
until recently by ferve nt efforts (in-
cluding by Fauci) to dismiss the lab-
leak theory for the origins of the pa n-
de mic - is tha t the U.S. gove rnme nt's
American college campuses have
announced that they'll require vacci-
nations for students returning in the
fall. There's no ha rd count of how
many bus inesses are requiring vacci-
nations or test results to come back to
wor k, but the anecdotal a nswer ap-
pears to be "a lot."
T here is nothing new about this . We
do not solely rely on argume ntation to
persuade people to wear seatbelts . A
majority of U.S. s tates do not leave it
to individual debaters to hash out
whether you can smoke in indoor
workplaces. Polio and measles were
murderous, but their near elimination
required vaccine mandates, not just
public education. When George Wash-
ington wanted to protect his soldiers
from smallpox, he made vaccinations
mandatory. It
Emmanuel worked. "No
revolutionary
Macron, the
regiments were
president incapacitated by
of France, the disease dur-
proposed a law ing the southern
requiring either campaign, and
proof of the mandate
vaccina tion or arguably helped
a negative test win the yearslong
war," wrote Aaron
result for
Ca rroll.
many indoor T he objection I
activities. The find most con-
mere prospect vincing to any
of a vaccine kind of vaccine
mandate set off mandate is that
mass protests. we have not built
It also led to the infras tructure
to make it work.
a surge in
What if someone
vaccina tions. who received a
vaccine has lost
her card, or he r
information was wrongly recorded
when she got her shot? If we try to
car ry this out through smartphones,
wha t if you don't have a s ma rtphone,
or you lose it? If you want to choose
frequent testing, how do you get
access to those tests, and who pays
for it, a nd how are the results re-
corded? If you have a problem, who
do you call to solve it? How long a re
the wait times when you call? What if
you need an answer quickly?
I covered both the debacle of the
HealthCare.gov launch and the now-
multidecade failure to transition to
electronic medical records. We just
watched sta te unemployme nt insur-
ance systems nearly collapse under
the demands of the pa ndemic. Per-
scie ntific establishment did support
gain-of-function research tha t de-
se rved far more public deba te tha n it
got. Also incontrovertibly true is that
be neficia ries of tha t funding engaged
in deceptive tactics and outrig ht men-
dacity to shield their research from
public scrutiny while de nouncing their
critics as conspiracymongers.
" In one State De partme nt meeting ,
officials seeking to dema nd transpar-
ency from the Chinese gove rnment say
they were explicitly told by colleagues
not to explore the Wuhan Institute of
Virology's gain-of-function research,
because it would bring unwelcome
atte ntion to U.S. government fund ing
of it," Va nity Fair's
Ka therine Eba n
Distrust in
reported last
public-health month in a n e x-
messaging is pose of the gove rn-
also sown when ment's inte rnal
public-health de bates over the
m essengers source of the pan-
are less than de mic.
completely II millions feel
trustworthy. tha t some public-
health e xpe rts are
not as he roic or as
honest as their
media stenographers make them out to
be, the re's a good reason for it.
Wha t goes for questions a bout the
origins of the pandemic goes also for
questions about its handling. The
C.D.C. va stly ove rstated the risks of
outdoor s pread of the virus, which (a t
least until the e mergence of the Delta
variant) appea rs to be closer to 0.1
pe rcent tha n as high as 10 percent.
Fa uci lied - there's no othe r word for
it - about what he saw as the thresh-
old fig ure for reaching herd immunity,
based, as Donald McNeil reported in
The Times in Dece mbe r, on "his gut
feeling th at the country is finally ready
to hear w hat he really thinks ."
haps we don't have the capacity to do
this well. But with so many public and
private e mployers mandating vaccina-
tion for their workforces, we'll know
soon enough. Either they 'll build mod-
els tha t can scale or they will fail spec-
tacularly enough to settle the question.
And either way, this suggests a ste p
the government could take right now:
Funding, building and deploying an
excellent vaccination passport infra-
structure - backed up by ubiquitous
rapid-testing options, for those cases
when the passport fails - that private
and public employers can use to imple-
ment their own policies.
Though I'd like to believe otherwise,
I don't think American politics can
support a na tional vaccination man-
date. The places that would most bene-
fit from a ma ndate would be those
most opposed to following one, and
deepenin g pa rtisan divisions here
would be catastrophic (this is a prob-
lem that also afflicts the C.D.C.'s new
masking guidance, as my colleague
David Leonhardt notes ). A high-stakes
showdown between, say, the federal
government a nd the State of Florida
over a mandate would be a distraction
we don't need. Quickly building the
records and testing options for individ-
ual employers to take the first steps
seems like the r ig ht middle ground, at
least for now.
Making it more a nnoying to be un-
vaccinated won't persuade everyone to
get a shot. But we don't need eve ryone.
According to Kaiser's data, 16 percent
of Ame rican adults are stilJ in the
wait-and-see or only-if-required cate-
gories. If they all got vaccinated, the
country hit herd immunity in mos t
places. If more of the unvaccinated
were routinely ge tting tested, that
would help, too. And if cases then fell,
the restrictions could lift.
The Delta strain is fearsome enough,
but if we keep permitting the virus to
dance across the defenseless, we could
soon have a strain that e vades vac-
cines while retaining lethality, or that
a ttacks childre n with more force. Ove r
and over again throughout this pan-
de mic, the same pa ttern has played
out: We haven't done e nough to sup-
press the virus whe n we still could, so
we have had to impose far more draco-
nia n lockdowns and grieve far more
death, once we have lost control. For
this reason among many, I urge those
w ho object to vaccination passports as
an unprecedented stricture on liberty
to widen their tragic imagina tion.
AllX WONG/GaTI IMAGf.S
An alar ming C.D.C. study found
tha t Hispa nic a nd Black childre n
were a t greate r risk of being hospital-
ized for Covid, which contributed to
the pressure to keep public schools
closed to in-person teaching despite
mounting evidence tha t schools we re-
n't viral hot zones.
The impact of this misinformation
on everyday life has bee n imme nse.
And while it may have the virtue of
being offered with the best intentions
or out of an abunda nce of ca ution, it
has probably done more to undermine
public confide nce in establis hment
science than a Florida quack. The
credibility of public-health experts
depends on the unde rsta nding tha t
the job of infor ming the public mea ns
offe ring the whole truth, unce rtainties
included, ra the r tha n offe ring Noble
Lies in the service of wha tever they
think the public needs to hear.
These same expe rts could risk
further diminishing their c redibility if
their assurances about vaccine effica-
cy prove ove rly fervent. A prelimi-
nary study from Israel suggests the
Pfize r shot loses much of its ability to
protect agains t infection afte r a few
months , though it continues to protect
against severe disease. That's still a
decisive a rgument for the vaccine,
but a ste p down from previous prom-
ises. If we end up needing a third,
fourth or fifth shot - a nd if ser ious
conditions like myocarditis wind up
linked to the vaccines - the e rosion
of public trus t could turn into a land-
slide.
So, by all means, let's continue to
e xpose a nd de nounce mis informa tion
coming from the fe ver swa mps of
Alte rnative America. But it won't do
s ufficient good until the guardia ns of
public health hold themselves to a
higher standard of truthfulness and
accounta bility. Physicia n, heal thyself.
WELL

A common heart problem

that often goes ignored
Personal Health
BY J ANE E. BRODY
Ned Hallick, a lighting specialist accus-
tomed to ha uling heavy equipment,
was 63 w hen he fir st noticed occa-
sional spells of lightheadedness. Then
one day, Mr. Hallick, who lives in
Brooklyn , told me, "l became so ex-
hausted t ha t walking up the subway
stairs felt like I wa s climbing a moun-
tain."
His primary care doctor, suspecting
a heart p roble m, did several tests,
including an EKG, a nd based on the
results, referred him to a cardiologist.
Diagnosis : a trial fibrilla tion, or A-fib,
the most commonly occurring heart-
r hythm abnormality.
In A-fib , the atria, the two uppe r
cha mbe rs of the hea rt, beat rapidly
a nd chaotically out of sync with the
ve ntricles, the hea rt's lower pumping
cha mbers that are responsible for
circulating blood throughout the body.
The ve ntricles may then be unable to
pump enough blood to meet the body's
needs, re sulting in sluggish circulation,
fatigue a nd breathless ness.
A-fib affects some three million
adults in the United States, a numbe r
that is expected to quadruple in the
coming decade a s the popula tion ages
a nd ris k factors like obesity, dia be tes
a nd high blood pressure become even
more common. The life time r isk of
developing A-fib is greater tha n 20
pe rcent, yet many people don't even
CBJRGE rntERf.rC.E FOR ll-lE NEW YORK TIMES know they have it.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Experts recommend avoiding crowded spaces and wearing a mask when indoors with people whose vaccination status is unknown. Prope r diagnosis and prompt trea t-
ment, howe ve r, can be lifesaving. In a
report published in The New England
Journal of Medicine in Ja nua ry, Dr.
called beta blockers and calcium block-
ers that help the heart s ustain a nor-
mal rhythm. Pa tients are also given a n
a nticoagulant to prevent blood clots.
Several currently popula r anticoagu-
lants, including Xarelto (rivaroxaban),
which Mr. Hallick takes , have persist-
e nt anti-clotting effects e ven if patie nts
miss a dose or two, which may help to
a ve rt a stroke. These a nticoagulants
also do not require close monitoring of
their effects on clotting , unlike their
predecessor Coumadin (warfarin),
which was for ma ny yea rs the leading
a nticoagulant for treating A-fib.
Coumadin has one important adva n-
tage ove r the newer medications of a n
almost immediate reversal of its anti-
clotting effect whe n pa tie nts must stop
ta king it to prevent excessive bleeding,
say, before surgery or following a n
injury.
CAN A-FIB DRUGS STOP WORKING?
Yes, that's what ha ppened with Mr.
Hallick. He was doing well on medica-
tion for seve n years until May, whe n a
routine checkup revealed that, unbe-
known to him, his A-fib had recurred
a nd his heart was beating 165 times a
minute, about double the normal rate.
"I had been getting a little out of
breath a nd finding it harder to walk
uphill, but I wrote it off;' he recalled. "I
thought I'm now 70 a nd maybe really
out of s ha pe thanks to the pa ndemic."
A medication cha nge a nd two shocks
to try to restore a normal heart rhythm
helped only b riefly, a nd Mr. Hallick has
just unde rgone a procedure that prom-
ises a more lasting benefit : destruction
of the cells along the back wall of his
hea rt's left atrium that are transmit-
ting er ra tic signals to the ventricles.
The procedure, called ablation, in-
volves sna king a ca theter through a
vein into the a trium and eithe r burning

Mask guidance gains nuance William G. Stevenson a nd Dr. Gregory

W hether to step up
defenses against Covid-19
variants depends on setting
BY TARA PARKER-POPE
As the Delta variant of Covid spreads
a mong the unvaccina ted, ma ny fully
vaccinated people are also beginning to
worry. Is it time to ma sk up again?
While the re's no one-size-fits-all an-
swer to the question, most experts
agree that masks remain a wise precau-
tion in certain settings for both the vac-
cinated a nd unvaccinated. This week,
t he U.S. Centers for Disea se Control rec-
omme nded that fully vaccina ted people
"wea r a ma sk in public indoor sett ings in
a reas of substantial or high tra nsmis-
sion." How ofte n you use a mask will de-
pe nd on pe r sonal health tolerance and
r isk, the infection and vaccination rates
in your community, a nd whom you're
spending time with, as well as local ma n-
dates.
The bottom line is this : While being
vaccinated protects against serious ill-
ness a nd hospitalization from Covid-19,
no vaccine offers 100 pe rce nt protection.
As long as large numbe rs of people re-
main unvaccina ted a nd continue to
spread coronavirus, vaccinated people
will be exposed to the Delta varia nt, a nd
a small pe rce ntage of them will develop
so-called breakthrough infections . .
WHEN IS A MASK NEEDED?
F irst ask yourself these questions.
• Are the people I'm with also vacci-
nated?
• Wha t's the case rate and vaccination
ra te in my community?
• Will I be in a poorly ventila ted indoor
space, or outside? Will the increased
risk of exposure last for a few minutes or
for hours?
• What's my per sonal risk ( or the r isk for
those around me) for complications
from Covid-19?
Exper ts agree that if everyone you're
with is vaccinated a nd symptom-free,
you don't need to wear a m ask.
"I don't wear a mask hanging out with
other vaccinated people," said Dr.
Ashish K. J ha, dean of the Brown Uni-
versity School of Public Health in Provi-
dence, R.I. " I don't even t hink about it.
I'm going to the office with a bunch of
people, and they're all vaccinated . I'm
not worried a bout it."
Healthy vaccinated people who
are unlikely to face complications
have to decide what level of risk
they are willing to tolerate.
But once you sta rt to ve nture into e n-
closed public spaces where the cha nces
of your e ncountering unvaccinated peo-
ple a re greater, a mask is probably a
good idea. Being fully vaccina ted re-
mains the strongest protection against
Covid-19, but risk is c umulative. The
more opportunities you give the virus to
challenge the antibodies you've built up
from your vaccine, the hig he r your risk
of coming into contact with a la rge
e nough exposure that the virus will
brea k through the protective barrier
genera ted by your vaccine.
For that reason, the case ra te a nd vac-
cination rate of your community are
among the most important factors influ-
e ncing the need for masks. In Vermont,
Massachusetts, Connecticut a nd Rhode
Island, for instance, more tha n 70 per-
cent of adults a re fully vaccina ted. In
Alabama, Mississippi and Arka nsas,
fewe r than 45 percent of adults a re vac-
cinated. In some U.S. counties, overall
vaccination rates are far lower.
"We're two Covid na tions right now,"
said Dr. Peter Hotez, dean of the Na-
tional School of Tropical Medicine at
Baylor College of Medicine in Houston
a nd co-director of the Cente r for Vaccine
Developme nt at Te xas Childre n's Hospi-
tal. In Harris County, Texas, where Dr.
Hotez lives, case counts ha ve been ris-
ing, up by 116 percent over two weeks in
J uly, a nd less tha n half the community is
fully vaccinated. " I'm wearing a mask
indoors most of the time," Dr. Hotez said.
Finally, masking is more important in
poorly ventilated indoor spaces than
outdoors, where risk of infection is ex-
tre mely low. Dr. J ha notes that he re-
cently dashed into a coffee shop, un-
masked, because in his a rea of the coun-
try, infection rates are low a nd vaccina-
tion rates are high.
Your personal ris k ma tters, too. If you
a re olde r or immune compromised, your
a ntibody response to the vaccine may
not be as strong as a young pe rson's.
Avoiding crowded spaces a nd wearing a
mask whe n you're indoor s a nd don't
know the vaccina tion s tatus of those
a round you is a good idea.
WHY ARE EXPERTS RECONSIDERING?
When the U.S. Cente rs for Disease Con-
trol a nd Prevention announced that vac-
cinated people could stop wearing
masks two months ago, case counts
we re dropping, vaccina tions we re on
the rise and the highly-infectious Delta
varia nt had not ye t taken hold. Since
the n, Delta has spread rapidly a nd now
accounts for more than 83 percent of
cases in the United Sta tes.
People infected with the Delta var iant
a re known to shed much highe r levels of
virus for longer periods of time com-
pared with earlie r lineages of the co-
ronavirus. One preliminary study esti-
mated the viral load is I,000 times g reat-
e r in people with the Delta variant.
These high viral loads give the virus
more opportunities to challenge your
a ntibodies and break through your vac-
cine's protection.
"This is twice as tra ns missible as the
orig inal lineage of Covid," said Dr.
Hotez. "T he reproductive numbe r of the
virus is around 6," he said, referring to
the number of people a virus carrier is
likely to infect. "That means 85 pe rcent
of the popula tion needs to be vaccina ted.
Only a few a reas of the country are
reaching that."
ARE LARGE GATHERINGS SAFE?
The answe r depe nds on your personal
risk tole rance and the level of vaccina-
tions a nd Covid cases in your communi-
ty. The more time you spe nd with unvac-
cina ted people in e nclosed spaces for
long periods of time, the higher your ris k
of crossing pa ths with the Delta variant,
or a ny other varia nts tha t may crop up.
Large gathe rings, by definition, offer
more opportunities to get infected with
coronavirus, eve n if you're vaccina ted.
Scie ntists have documented break-
through infections at a wedding in Okla-
homa and July 4 cele bra tions in
P rovincetown, Mass.
But even with the Delta varia nt, full
vaccination a ppears to be about 90 per-
cent effective at preventing serious ill-
ness a nd hospitalization from Covid-19.
If you a re at ve ry high risk for complica-
tions from Covid-19, howeve r, consider
avoiding risky situations a nd wea r a
mask when the vaccina tion sta tus of
those around you is unknown.
Vaccinated people who are at low r is k
of complications have to decide what
level of r isk they a re willing to tole rate.
Wearing a mask a t larger indoor gather-
ings will lower their risk for infection. If
you're healthy a nd vaccina ted but car-
ing for an aging pare nt or spending time
with othe rs at high risk, cons ide r their
risk too whe n deciding whether to a t-
te nd a n event or wear a mask.
F. Micha ud, ca rdiologists at Vanderbilt
University Medical Cente r in Tennes-
see, wrote that untreated A-fib can
raise the ris k of stroke by fourfold in
me n a nd about sixfold in wome n, a nd
can raise the risk of heart failure by
three tim es a nd 11 times, respectively.
A-fib is also associated with deme ntia,
likely the result of strokes a nd im-
paired circulation to the brain caused
by the abnormal heart r hythm. The
condition is directly or indirectly re-
sponsible for more than 158,000 deaths
a year.
HOW DO I KNOW IF I HAVE A-FIB?
Those affected ma y feel their heart
race, pound or flutte r periodically for
minutes at a time, or they may notice
occasional e pisodes of shortness of
breath, dizziness or undue fatigue
upon e xe rtion. The symptoms can be
tr iggered by excessive consumption of
alcohol or caffeine. In some people
with A-fib, the abnormal r hythms come
a nd go, w hile in others, they pers ist
a nd the h eart is una ble to restore a
normal rhythm without trea tment.
Unfortuna tely, ma ny people with
A-fib, including Mr. Hallick, dismiss
such sym ptoms as nothing unusual,
especially when they go away on their
own. You r doctor can do a n EKG or a
treadmill heart test, or you may wear a
portable monitor for seve ral weeks to
look for a bnormal heart rhythms, to
confir m a diagnosis of A-fib. Such tests
can help distinguish A-fib from less
serious conditions that may cause the
heart to flutte r, like anxiety a nd stress.
HOW IS A-FIB TREATED?
If A-fib is confirmed, your doctor may
try to shock the heart back into a
normal rhythm us ing a procedure
called electr ical cardioversion, in
which a n electrical curre nt is a pplied
to the che st using paddles. You will be
seda ted for the brief procedure and not
feel the s hocks .
Longer te rm, most pa tients with
A-lib can be effectively and safely
treated with medication, usually drugs
or freezing the cells that misfi re.
Controlled trials have shown tha t
over time, ablation is significantly
more effective in correcting A-fib than
drug therapy. In one recent study of
203 pa tie nts, ablation successfully
prevented A-fib a year later in a bout 75
pe rcent of patients in one group,
whereas drug the ra py helped only 45
percent of the patie nts in the othe r. In
otherwise healthy people like Mr.
Hallick, ablation can be done as an
outpatie nt, followed by a few days of
limited activity while the hea rt heals
from resulting infla mma tion.
Dr. Stevenson of Vande rbilt said
some patients with pers istent A-fib
prefer to undergo ablation ra ther tha n
continually taking medications, which
can cause bleeding proble ms or other
side effects. On the other ha nd, the
be nefit of abla tion is some times de-
layed. In the fi rst fe w months afte r
a blation, he said, a bout half of patients
e xpe rie nce a bnormal heart r hythms
a nd may req uire a cardiac shock or
drug treatme nt until the heart fully
recovers from the procedure.
ARE NEW TREATMENTS ON T HE WAY?
Mr. Hallick is participa ting in a n ongo-
ing clinical trial of a new a nd presum-
a bly safer procedure called pulsed field
a blation tha t destroys the errant cells
by making holes in the m with electrical
shocks. The procedure is said to be
faster tha n othe r ablation techniques
like caute ry or freezing, a nd less likely
to damage the esophagus, which lies
ne xt to the a trium.
The new technique, known comme r-
cially as Fara pulse, was a pproved for
use in Europe in J a nuary but is not yet
licensed by the Food and Drug Admin-
istration in the United States. It is
being tested in a controlled clinical
trial involving at least 350 pa tie nts a t
more than 30 America n medical cen-
ter s, including the Mount Sinai Health
System in Ne w York.
"If we're going to switch, we need to
prove that pulsed field a blation is
clearly be tte r a nd safer than what we
do now," Dr. Stevenson said.

Signs that our cells turn chatty after exercise

Fitness
BY GRETCHEN REYNOLDS
We all know tha t lifting weights can
build up our muscles. But by cha nging
the inne r workings of cells, weight
training may also shrink fat, according
to an e nlightening new study of the
molecular unde rpinnings of resis ta nce
exercise. The study, which involved
mice a nd people, found tha t after
weight training, muscles create a nd
release little bubbles of genetic ma-
te rial that can flow to fat cells, jump-
starting processes the re related to fat
burning .
The results add to mounting scie ntif-
ic evidence that resista nce exercise
ha s unique benefits for fat loss. They
also under score how extensive and
interconnected the inte rnal effects of
e xercise can be.
Many of us pigeonhole resista nce
training as muscle building . Lifting
weights - or working agains t our
body weight as we bob through push-
ups, squa ts or chair dips - will notice-
a bly boost our muscles' size a nd
strength. But a growing numbe r of
studies suggest weight training also
resha pes our meta bolis ms a nd waist-
lines.
How weight training revamps body
fat remains murky. Pa rt of the effect
occurs because muscle is metabolically
active, so adding muscle m as s by
lifting should increase e nergy expe ndi-
ture. But tha t doesn't fully explain the
effect, because adding muscle mass
requires time and repetition, while
some of the metabolic effects of weight
training on fat stores seem to occur
immediately afte r exe rcise.
Pe rha ps, then, something happe ns
a t a molecula r level right afte r resist-
a nce workouts tha t ta rgets fat cells , a
hy pothesis that scientists a t the Uni-
versity of Ke ntucky in Lexington, the
Unive rsity of Nebraska-Lincoln a nd
other institutions decided to investi-
ga te. Maybe, they specula ted, muscles
and fat cha tted together a mia bly afte r
a workout.
In the pas t decade, the idea tha t cells
and tissues communicate across the
expanse of ou r bodies has become
widely accepted, though the complex-
ity of the inte ractions re mains bog-
gling. Expe rime nts show tha t muscles,
for ins ta nce, release a cascade of hor-
mones a nd other proteins after e xe r-
cise tha t e nte r the bloodstrea m, course
along to var ious organs and trigger
bioche mical reactions, in a process
C That muscle swiftly hyper trophied, or
Resistance workouts may raise molecular crosstalk between muscle and fat tissue.
known as cellula r crosstalk.
Our tissues also may pump out tiny
bubbles, known as vesicles, during
crosstalk. Once conside red microscopic
trash bags, stuffed with cellula r debris,
ves icles now a re known to contain
active, healthy genetic mate r ial a nd
other substa nces. Intriguingly, some
e xperiments indicate that ae robic
exercise prompts muscles to release
such vesicles. But few studies had
ANDREW ll:STA FOR lllE NEW YORK TIMES
looked into whethe r resista nce exer-
cise might also result in vesicle forma-
tion a nd inter-tissue cha tter.
For the new study, w hich was pub-
lished in May in The FASEB Journal,
from the Fede ration of Ame rica n Socie-
ties for Expe rime ntal Biology, the
researcher s decided to exa mine cells of
bodybuilding mice. They incapacitated
se veral of the leg muscles in healthy
adult mice, leaving a single muscle to
car ry all the de mands of move me nt.
bulked up, providing an accelerated
ve rsion of resista nce training.
Before a nd after that process, the
researchers drew blood, biopsied tis-
sues, centrifuged fluids a nd microscop-
ically searched for vesicles a nd other
molecula r cha nges in the tissues.
They n oted plenty. Before their
improvised weight training, the ro-
de nts' leg muscles had teemed with a
particula r snippe t of ge netic mater ial,
known as miR-1, tha t modula tes mus-
cle growth. In normal, untra ined mus-
cles, miR-1, one of a group of tiny
stra nds of gene tic mate rial known as
microRNA, keeps a bra ke on muscle
building.
After the rodents' resistance exer-
cise, which consisted of walking
around, the a nimals' leg muscles a p-
peared de ple ted of miR-1. At the sa me
time, the vesicles in their bloodstream
now thronged with the stuff, as did
nearby fa t tissue. The scientists con-
cluded th at the a nimals ' muscle cells
somehow packed those bits of mi-
croRNA tha t retard hypertrophy into
vesicles a nd posted the m to neighbor-
ing fat cells, w hich the n allowed the
muscle s immediately to g row.
But wh at was the miR-1 doing to the
fat once it a rrived , the scientist won-
dered? To find out, they marked vesi-
cles from weight•trained mice with a
fluorescent dye, injected the m into
untrained an imals, a nd tracked the
glowing bubbles' pa ths. T he vesicles
homed in on fat, the scie ntists saw,
the n dissolved and deposited their
miR-1 ca rgo there.
Soon after, some of the genes in the
fat cells went into overdr ive. These
genes help direct the breakdow n of fat
into fatty acids, which other cells the n
can use as fuel, reducing fat s tores. In
effect, weight training was shr inking
fat in mice by creating vesicles in
muscles tha t, through genetic signals,
told the fat it was time to break itself
a pa rt.
"T he process was just remarkable,"
said John J. McCar thy, a professor of
physiology at the Univer sity of Ke n-
tucky, w ho was an a uthor of the study
with his then graduate stude nt Ivan J.
Vechetti Jr. a nd other colleagues.
For a final facet of the study, the
scientists gathe red blood a nd tissue
from healthy men a nd wome n who had
pe rfor med a single, fatiguing lowe r-
body weight workout a nd confirmed
tha t, as in mice, miR-1 levels in the
volunteer s' muscles dropped after
their lilting, while the quantity of
miR-1-containing vesicles in their
bloodstreams soared.
Sports
Playing in soccer's twilight zone
On Soccer
BY RORY SMITH
Daniel Alves has seen it all, done it all.
He has won league titles in three coun-
tries, picked up nine cups, conquered
Europe with his club a nd South Ame r-
ica. He has 41 m ajor honors to his
name, officially making him the most
decorated player in his tory. But still,
when A ndre Ja rdine asked him to take
on one last j ob, his eyes lit up.
Jardine, the m a nager of Brazil's
Olympic men's soccer team, had
framed his pitch s martly. There was,
he told Alves, still one thing missing
from his care er. For all that he h ad
achieved, he had never been to the
Olympic Games, much less won a
medal. "Let's complete your resume,"
J ardine said. At 38, ente ring a third
decade as a professional, Alves could
not resist.
The appeal, for Jardine - only three
years older tha n the player heap-
pointed as captain for Brazil's cam-
paign in Tokyo - is obvious. Men's
soccer at the Olympics is, essentially,
an u nder-23 affair: A majority of each
team's squad in Japa n can h ave been
born no earlier than J a n. 1, 1997. But
there are s paces reserved for three
"over-age" players.
Ja rdine had bee n considering how
best to fill those s pots on Brazil's roster
whe n it eme rged tha t injury would rule
Alves out of the Copa Amer ica. He re,
he thought, was the ch ance to draft a
figure who was " respected by all Bra-
zilian players, a leader, a winner," a
player not only with "lots of charis ma"
but with a wealth of experie nce to help
g uide his younger tea mmates.
It is easy to understand why it
struck such a chord w ith Alves. "Chal-
le nges like this really motivate me," he
said. "The Olympics a re magical : You
get e motional thinking about them. To
represent my country, my people, in a
competition as important as the
Olympics is really, really incredible."
And yet- setting aside the warm-
ing, rosy glow of the idea of Alves's
adding yet a nothe r trophy to his per-
sonal palmares, all in the na me of
defe nding his country's honor - his
presence a t the tourn ament does not
necessarily feed into the idea that
men's soccer at the Oly mpics is espe-
cially important at all. That is not to
For sprinters, Tokyo's hot weather feels just right
But the city was deemed
too hot for marathoners, so
they'll run in a cooler region
BY JERE LONGMAN
Marathoners are the NASCAR racers of
running, trying to keep their radiators
from boiling over during 26.2 miles a nd
more than two hours on the road. Sprint-
ers don't have the same worries about
heat a nd humidity. They a re dragsters,
generating massive power a nd searing
speed then pulling the parachute after a
few seconds.
The me n's a nd women's Oly mpic
marathons will be held in Sapporo, J a-
pa n, 500 miles north of Tokyo, to escape
the smothe ring blanket tha t is Tokyo's
average August weathe r: a high of 88
degrees Fa hrenheit (31 degrees Cel-
s ius), low ol 77 (25); humidity a t 73 per-
cent ; a "feels-like" tem perature or heat
index of 101.3 degrees.
But when the me n's a nd women's
sprints begin Friday, most compe titors
will e mbrace the hot weathe r, reveling
in cond itions that Carl Lewis, the nine-
time Olympic cha mpion s printe r and
long jumpe r, calls "the Caribbean with-
out the breeze."
"Ninety-nine pe rcent of s printe rs love
it, especially Americans," said Lewis,
now a n assis tant track and field coach a t
the University of Houston. He might
have added, so do Jamaicans, the
world's other dominant sprinters.
Historically, top per formances from
100 meters to the metric mile, at 1,500
meters, a nd field events like the long
jump have mostly come in July a nd Au-
g ust, the hottest time, when major inter-
national competitions are held.
If the pas t is a ny guide, some extraor-
dinary results could occur in Tokyo, per-
haps especially in sprinting and jump-
ing performances enha nced by many
factors, including rapid muscle contrac-
tion in the heat a nd, to a lesser extent,
the physics of reduced air res ista nce.
"You need those muscles to fire at a
rapid rate," said Rai Benja min, a n Amer -
ican hurdler a nd sprinter who is a gold
medal candidate in the men's 400-mete r
hurdles. "When you're cold a nd s tiff, it
makes for you to be more cautious. Al-
thoug h some times you don't want to be,
s ubconsciously it's in the back of your
mind, 'OK, its cold out here I don't want
to hurt myself.'"
There is a nother weather-related
phenomenon, widely discussed but little
unders tood, in the track and field world :
A ha ndful of astonishing record per -
formances, in Tokyo a nd elsewhe re over
Daniel Alves of Brazil is an Olympian at age 38. In recruiting him to play in a tournament with mostly young players, the team's manager said: " Let 's complete your resumE!."
question his motives: Alves is in Tokyo
to perform, a nd to win. And Brazil is
winning: On Saturday they will play
Egypt in the quarte rfinals . Alves has
said his "ultimate a mbition," is to
compete for Brazil in the World Cup
next s umme r. This is a cha nce for him
to stake a claim, to prove he can still
cut it w hen s urrounded by players a
decade and a half his junior.
But the s ight of Alves, one of the
finest players of his generation, in a
cobbled-together under-23 tea m serves
to highlight the inescapable sense that
Olympic men's soccer is something of a
the past half-century, occur red just be-
fore or after s tormy weather.
"If it rains right before a r ace, I'm go-
ing to run fast," said Noah Lyles of the
United States, the Olympic favorite in
the men's 200 meters.
Coincidence? A correla tion be tween
pe rformance and s tormy weathe r, when
the atmosphere becomes electrically
ch arged with molecules known as nega-
tive ions? No one knows with a ny cer-
tainty.
Purported cardiovasc ula r, res pira-
tory, psychological and cognitive bene-
fits of exposure to negative ions have
been a matter of scientific debate for a
century. Enthusiasts sometimes call
the m "vita mins of the air." Research has
been incons istent. Some skeptics dis-
1niss the supposed benefits as pseudo-
science.
"If someone would come up with actu-
al informa tion, tha t would be inte rest-
ing;' s aid La nce Brauma n, who coaches
Lyles a nd other Olympic favorites in
Clermont, Fla., in the Orla ndo a rea.
"These guys a re neuromuscular ma-
chines. Anything that would stimulate
the electrical system of the body would
theore tically help."
novelty act, both a major international
tourna ment a nd a n inconvenient after-
thought, an honor with no clear mean-
ing, a trophy with a n asterisk.
A gla nce a t the other over-age play-
ers who joined Alves in Tokyo illus-
trates the issue. New Zeala nd has
selected arguably its best player, in the
burly sh ape of the Burnley striker
Chris Wood, to give it the best cha nce
of securing a medal. Fra nce, on the
other ha nd, has chosen Andre-Pierre
Gig nac and Floria n Thauvin, curre ntly
playing for Tigres, in Mexico, and the
Montpellier midfielder TE!j i Savanier,
Performance advantages for sprint-
ers in hotter weather are relatively
small, gains of l percent to 2 percent, sci-
entists say. Other factors like altitude,
biomechanics a nd doping are consid-
ered more impactful. The outcome of
races in Tokyo could depend on a lllnn -
ber of influences: Top runners compe t-
ing head-to-head. Advanced s hoe tech-
nology. The absence of energy from
specta tors, banned by the pandemic-re-
lated regula tions. Reaction to the start-
ing gun. The length a nd freq ue ncy of
strides. The amount of force exerted
into the ground. The ha rdness or spring-
iness of the track. T he speed a nd direc-
tion of the wind.
Not all a thletes respond to heat the
same way. But it w ill play a role. And in
sprinting a nd jumping events that can
be decided by a hundredth of a second or
a qua rte r of a n inch, tiny be nefits might
help make the difference between win-
nin g a gold medal or no medal at all.
"That could be the s mall ma rgin of
performance that will make you faster
a nd put you on the podium," said Olivier
Girard, an exercise physiologist at the
Univers ity of Western Australia who
studies sprinting a nd heat. "Tokyo is
none of whom might be regarded as
their country 's best player.
Argentina a nd Romania, meanwhile,
na med only one over-age player each.
One is a goalkeepe r, a nd the othe r is a
defender who does not currently have
a club. Neithe r country h as been
tempted to send a nyone who might
count as a star. Or, rathe1; neither has
been able to, because clubs are not
required to release their players for the
Olympics, because the Games do not
feature on men's soccer 's official, sanc-
tioned cale ndar.
All of the players in Japan will, of
KIRBY LWUSA TODAY SPORTS. V1A R.El1Tf.RS
supposed to be the hottest Olympics in
history, so surely we might see some-
thing interesting."
At the last major international trac k
a nd field cOinpetition held in Tokyo, the
1991 world cha mpions hips, Mike Powell
set a world record of29 feet 4 ½ inches in
the long jump that still sta nds. Lewis,
who e ngaged Powell in a n e pic jumping
battle, also set a world record there of
9.86 seconds at 100 me te rs . That record
has been broken re peatedly s ince the n
but remains a landmark. For the first
time, six sprinters ran below IO seconds
in the same race.
Hotter tempe ra tures help boost the
short-term power output needed fo r
world-class s printing. There is probably
a n optimal tempera ture r ange in skele-
tal muscles for unleashing the e nergy-
producing molecule in cells known as
adenosine triphos phate, or ATP; for ac-
tivating motor ne rves a nd for quicker
muscle contractions that increase the
rate or freque ncy of a sprinter 's strides,
scientists say.
"Those slightly warme r tempera-
tures like 80-90 degrees a re going to be
much bette r tha n 60-70 degrees fo r
that," said Robe rt Chapma n , an e nvi-
PH1LNOBlf./R.EIJTIR.S
course, regard being a t a n Olympics -
even in Tokyo's diminished circum-
s tances - as a rare privilege. Those
who have competed in previous
Games, even established sta rs of Eu-
rope's major leagues, have been awed
by the a tmosphe re (and, to a n exte nt,
the abandon) of the athletes' village,
s ta r-struck by their sudden proximity
to the biggest na mes in track a nd field.
But exactly what success - or fail-
ure - means in a soccer sense is less
obvious. It is only a few weeks since
Lionel Messi was celebrating winning
his first major international honor with
Noah Lyles, left, at the U.S. Olympic track
and field trials in June, said he runs
faste r after rainfall. Above, Carl Lewis in
the long jump final at the World Track
and Field Championship in Tokyo in 1991.
ronme ntal physiologis t a t Indiana Uni-
versity a nd the director of sports sci-
e nce a nd medicine for U.S.A. Tr ack a nd
Field, the national governing body.
The top Ame rican spr inters, a nd
ma ny inte rna tional stars, train in the hot
weather of Florida, Texas a nd Califor-
nia. Jamaica has a similar climate for
speed. Heat serves as a passive warm-
up device for muscles, so it does not take
as long to get the m limber with pre-race
exercises, a thletes say.
"When it's warmer weather, I'm a ble
to foc us firmly on my race plan and tac-
tics," s aid Trayvon Bromell of the United
States, a gold medal favor ite in the
men's 100 meters. "When it's cooler, I
feel that my mind drifts to making sure
my body is warmer first. It leads me to
build a diffe rent pre-race pla n."
Hot, humid air is also less dense than
colder air a nd s lightly reduces drag.
This helps explain baseballs traveling
farthe r w he n hit in hotter weathe r. As
the temperature rises, gas molecules in
the air m ove faster and farther apart,
lowering res ista nce to moving objects .
And con tra ry to wha t ma ny people
think, humid air is lighter, not heavie r,
tha n d ry air beca use water vapor dis-
places weig htier nitrogen a nd oxygen
molecules.
In places near sea level, like Tokyo,
the comb ination of heat and humidity
s hould result in about a 3 percent reduc-
( • • • Tokyo *Jj(
Argentina a t the Copa America. At last,
Messi had ended not only his long wait
to achieve something with his country,
but Argentina's restless purgatory in
the inte rnational wilderness. It was, all
the stories said, the nation's first major
trophy s ince 1993.
Exce pt, of course, that it wasn't.
Argentina had won gold in the
Oly mpics in both 2004 and 2008, and
Messi had been part of the 2008 team.
That neither was mentioned high-
lighted the s ta rk, and pe rhaps unfair,
truth a bout Olympic me n's soccer:
Ultima tely it does not count, not really,
not properly. It exists in a n uneasy,
liminal sort of zone, somewhere be-
tween a youth competition a nd an
adult one, be tween a uthe ntic a nd
e rsatz.
In the women's game, of course, that
is not the case. Or, at least, it has not
traditionally been the case. The
Olympics have at times been the most
high-profile event in the women's
calendar, the grandest stage that the
game could offer.
When Abby Wambach, the former
U.S. striker, released a book on leader-
s hip in 2019, she was referred to on the
cover, not as a World Cup winner but
as a "two-time Oly mpic gold medalist."
The team that the United States sent
for its opening game of the Oly mpic
tournament - a 3-0 defeat to Sweden,
in which Megan Rapinoe suggested
that the team had done some "dumb"
th ings - contained only two changes
from the side that sta rted the World
Cup fin al two years ago. So ma ny of
the biggest names in the women's
game are in Tokyo, in fact, that the
tourname nt has the air of an all-star
competition.
The te mptation is to believe that the
event's status wiJI wane as the World
Cup continues to grow, that the adage
- that the Olympics is the pinnacle for
s ports that do not have one of their
own - will hold, that no sport, ulti-
mately, can have two pinnacles.
That is not necessarily true. Golf a nd
te nnis have both embraced their rela-
tively new s ta tus as Olympic disci-
plines. Winning gold at the Olympics -
compe ting a t the Olympics - always
means something. Wha t it means,
though - how much it means - is not
fixed. Alves sees it as a step on a jour-
ney. Messi saw it as a road to nowhe re.
Rapinoe may well see it as a destina-
tion in itself. But all of that can change.
The value of gold, after all, can rise a nd
fal l.
tion in air de ns ity (as compared to a 25
percent difference between sea level
and the 7,300-foot altitude in Mexico
City, the s ite of the 1968 Summer
Olympics), Chapma n said.
"Would a I- to 3-percent change in air
de nsity e nd up affecting perfo rmance?
It has to," he said. " It's just a question of
w hat's the magnitude a nd how does that
magnitude compare to the 57 other
things that can influence an athlete's
pe rforma nce from mental to physical to
everything else?"
The main concerns for sprinters in To-
kyo will be re maining properly hydrated
a nd rested; staying out of the s un as
much as possible a nd expending as little
e nergy as necessary to advance
th rough the preliminary rounds.
They might also want to pray for rain.
At the 1968 Oly mpics, Bob Beamon's
s ta rtling long jump, which broke the ex-
is ting record by nearly two feet, came
just before a storm. So did Wyomia
Tyus's world record in the women's 100
meters . Clearly, altitude influenced
those performances. But Powell's jump
that broke Beamon's record in 1991 also
came before a storm, in Tokyo, which is
only 130 feet above sea level.
Usain Bolt of Jamaica firs t broke the
world record in the 100 meters afte r a
rainstorm at a meet in New York before
the 2008 Beijing Olympics. A light rain
re portedly followed the setting of his
current world record, 9.58 seconds, at
the 2009 world cha mpionships in Berlin.
"My focus was always on executing
the race a nd I didn't care too much about
the weather,'' Bolt said.
In the 1970s, Soviet a nd East Ger man
scientists found no positive effect of neg-
ative ions on physical pe rforma nce, said
Alfred Nimme richter, a n Aus tr ian exer-
cise physiologist. His own 2014 research
on negative ions a nd cycling fou nd no in-
crease in oxygen consumption.
"From the gut, I would s ay the per-
formance versus storm relationship is
coincidental, a t least from a physiolog-
ical standpoint," Nimmerichter said.
Othe r research has variously sug-
gested that exposure to negative ions
could elevate mood and alertness, re-
duce stress a nd s timulate the fight-or-
flight response by increasing the hear t
rate and blood flow to the muscles.
Skepticism remains. Lewis recalled
that he was long-j umpi ng in India napo-
lis in the 1980s during s tormy weather
w hen a man excitedly approached his
father a nd said, "Oh my God. He's got to
j ump again. T he ions a re right. I was in
Mexico City a nd it was just like this for
Beamon."
And w hat d id his fathe r tell the ma n?
"Dude, seriously, get out of my fa ce."
 SPORTS
( • • • Tokyo§R~

Athletes' grueling wait for an Olympic moment

to promote themselves, to use social Olympic lore is filled with na mes of
Olympics Memo media to attract fans and please s pon- athletes who seemed unfazed by the
sors, some who provide the bulk of a n pressure to pe rform at the scheduled
a thlete's livelihood. time, from Bonnie Blair to Michael
It may not be a coincidence that Phelps, Shaun White to Chloe Kim,
BY JOHN BRANCH issues of me ntal health a re r is ing to Carl Lewis to Usain Bolt.
public consciousness in a n era of social Biles, until now.
media. Her decis ion to drop out of the team
TOKYO The Olympics, for all their But bringing an a udience along to event, followed by a next-day decision
charm, are a rather cruel setup. the Oly mpics may serve as a re minder to opt out of the all-around competition
They are a four-year time bomb. The that those faceless fans may expect as well, spurred immediate conversa-
world's bes t athletes a re assigned a something whe n the time comes. The tions about mental health, about the
date and a time to perform. They pre- Australia n s wimme r Aria rne Titmus, weight of expecta tions, about the e n-
pare, often in solitude a nd a nonymity, who won gold medals in her first two tire Olympic apparatus.
for a singl e moment on the calendar. It Olympic finals, said she dele ted every The Olympics, like all sports events,
gets closer w ith each t ick of the clock. social media app on her phone. create more losers than winne rs, and
As the countdown approaches zero, " It can sometimes be a bit over- some of the world's most accomplished
a sea of strangers expecting to be whelming ," she said. athletes could not connect expecta-
entertained turns its collective gaze in There a re about 11,000 athletes from tions to Olympic gold medals - from
their direction, eager to dole out pass- more tha n 200 countries compe ting in Mary Decker to Tyson Gay, Michelle
fail grades. Reputa tions are made or Tokyo. They all feel some level of Kwan to Lindsey Jacobellis, Ivica
broken. Lives are changed. pressure from the outside, especially if Kostelic to the 2004 U.S. men's basket-
No s ports event does it like the there is a n all-or-nothing expectation ball team.
Olympics. to succeed. Sergey Bubka broke the world
"The scale of everything is a bit The range of outcomes becomes record in the pole vault 35 times but
hard," Naomi Osaka said, after l osing a bina ry, at least on the public's report won only one gold medal. The speed-
third-round tennis ma tch days a fte r card: pass or fail. s ka ter Da n J a nsen fe ll down or came
lighting the Olympic cauldron to open These Oly mpics were made even up shor t over three Olympics before
the Tokyo Games. more c ruel by a year 's delay from the winning gold in his final race. The 2004
The schedule does not care if you a re pande mic. At first the countdown was U.S. men's basketball team had a ros-
ready. Adam Ondra, regarded as the pa used, the n a full year was added to te r of N.B.A. stars a nd future Hall of
world's bes t climber, recognizes this the clock. And strict protocols meant Fa mers a nd still won only bronze.
even before he arrives to his Olympic that travel parties to the Olympics It is happe ning in Tokyo, too. The
moment, as spor t climbing makes its were severely limited - none of the biggest gold medal upset so far might
de but next week. usual fa mily a nd frie nds who ty pically have been in ta ble tennis, whe re the
"In the Oly mpics or a ny g iven com- provide me ntal s upport. The people J apanese tea m of Jun Mizutani and
pe tition, you're just told to climb right The American Carissa Moore, above, in the women's surfing competition, said she was racked with nerves 20 minutes before her gold who usually sha re the experience, the Mi1na Ito stunned China's Xu Xin and
now," Ondra said. "And you're training medal ride. Below, from left, the climber Adam Ondra, the swimmer Katie Ledecky, and the table tennis duo Xu Xin and Liu Shiwen. believers and the huggers, are far Liu Shiwen in mixed doubles.
for many weeks and months before, away. "There's definitely pressure," Xu
knowing that you have to be ready for And with competitors having limited said. "Every pair faces pressure, b ut
that day." time in the Olympic Village (most of our expectations and aims a re differ-
In his us ual outdoor r ealm of big them could not check in until five days ent."
rock walls, the culture works in re- before their competition a nd had to That is true with a lot of Olympians.
verse. T he goal is to find the mome nt, leave within a day of competing) a nd The swimme r Katie Ledecky a rrived
not h ave it assigned to you. You tackle restricted interaction while they were having won five gold medals a nd one
the climb at your pace, at a time of there, the usual networks were snipped s ilver in two previous Olympic Games.
your choosing, on a day whe n condi- a way. The absence of fa ns in the s ta nds She earned silver in he r first race in
tions a re perfect and body and mind makes the sense of loneliness more Tokyo, a nd already some wondered
a re in sync. s ta rk. No one is there to cheer the w ha t was wrong.
If everything does not come togeth- effort, win or lose. On Wednesday, she finished fifth in
e r, if the moment feels wrong, you walk The surfe r Carissa Moore, a four- one race, the n won a gold medal in the
away. time world cha mpion, qualified for the 1,500 me ters. She missed her mome nt,
At the Olympics, Ondra is scheduled Olympics more tha n 18 months ago. then met the next one, all in about a n
to begin performing Aug. 3 at 5 p.m. CHANG W. LEE'/THE NEW YORK TIMES OOUGMlll.S{THENEWYORK TIMES H[DAYAlt/UJ,H AM1D/EPA, VIASHIJTTERSTOCK She was racked with nerves 20 min- hour.
Tick, tick, tick. utes before her gold medal heat. "People maybe feel bad for me not
The differe nce is not just aiming dy na m ic is playing out in real time It was jolting, coming as the clock "We hope America still loves us;' " I had to call home and be like, 'OK, winning everything, but I want people
toward the mome nt. It is the audie nce across the Tokyo Olympics. The Ameri- reached zero, when the world was Biles said. what do I do?'" she said. "T hey're like, to be more concerned about other
that awaits. can gymnast Simone Biles is only one tuned in to watch a nd judge. Hidde n in that sad statement is a ' You know what to do.' I don't think things going on in the world," Ledecky
"It is ma king the biggest pressure example, the biggest a mong ma ny. She explained la ter that the joy of twist - who are the Olympics for ? - tha t tha t little self-doubt voice ever said. "The most pressure I feel is the
that I've ever felt," Ondra said. "Be- At the team competition on Tuesday competing was replaced by the pres- a nd a n echo of othe r a thletes who feel goes away. It's just learning how to tell pressure I put on myself.''
cause normally, the only pressure that nig ht, she tried one trick. She didn't sure to please othe r people. Without the ache of disappointing strangers. her : ' Hey, just be quiet for a little bit, I That is wha t athletes often say. But it
I feel comes from myself." feel it. She s topped. The moment felt he r, the U.S. wome n's gymnastics team But it is a complicated rela tionship. got this."' is becoming apparent that it may not
None of this is new in sports, but the wrong. won silver. More tha n ever, athletes feel compelled Moore me t the mome nt. She won. be what they feel.

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Culture
A museum opens with artifacts and baggage
BERLIN
Amid spectacular pieces
at the Humboldt Forum are
questions of provenance
BY THOMAS ROGERS
For almost 20 years, Werner Kohl has
followed the saga of the Humboldt For-
um. Like many Germans, he has been
watching a nd listening since 2002, when
the government approved a plan for that
huge new cultural a ttraction in Berlin.
That's nearly two decades of debate,
protest, overspend a nd delay.
So last week, whe n he fi na lly stood in
the building's darkened exhibition
spaces, he was thrilled, he said.
"I've been looking forward to t his day
from the beginning," Kohl said. "I'm
he re to see if it delivers on what it pro-
posed."
Kohl, 63, was there to see "Ter rible
Beauty," a te mporary exhibition of ivory
artifacts ranging across 40,000 years. It
was one of six inaugural shows in the
Forum, which brings together several
museum collections in a reconstructed
Ba roque palace.
Located on the site of the demolished
East German Pa rliame nt a nd conceived
as Germany's equivale nt to the Louvre,
the Humboldt Forum was originally
scheduled to open in 2019 but ran into
construction delays. It is now ope ning in
phases during the next two years .
The Humboldt Forum's exterior, above and top, in Berlin is a reconstruction of a Baroque palace, but inside is a slick, modern mu-
seum. At right, above, tusks and ivory items carved in the early 20 th century by a Parisian craftsman are part of the " Terrible
Beauty" exhibition, right, which features 40,000 years of ivory artifacts and is one of six inaugural shows at the Humboldt Forum.
In addition to the ivory exhibition, the
Humboldt For um is also presenting
"Berlin Global," a display about the
city's rela tionship to the world ; a con-
ceptual show exploring huma n life afte r
climate cha nge; a nd spaces dedicated
to the history of the site.
The Forum's most disputed section is
yet to ope n : floors containing thousands
of ethnological a rtifacts from a va riety
of cultures, including a spectacula r Afri-
can throne a nd la rge wooden boats from
the South Pacific, ma ny of which were
acquired during Germany's expa nsion-
is t impe rial phase. Anticolonial activists
have argued tha t the Humboldt Forum
ha s not gone far e nough in investigating
the provenance of its objects.
Southern soul in the 21st century
ALBUM REVIEW
Leon Bridges carries
a decades-old tradition
foiward on his third album
BY J ON PARELES
Te nacity is baked into Southe rn soul.
It 's there in the grain a nd determina-
tion of the singing, in the patiently
rolling grooves, in how its down-to-
earth stories unfold. It's there in the
way the mus ic holds on to blues a nd
gospel roots connected to deepe r Afri-
can a ncestry. And it's there in the way
the sound persists and ada pts through
decades, finding new r hythms but still
testifying from the heart.
"Gold-Diggers Sound," the third
album by the Texas songwriter Leon
Bridges, offe rs his personalized sur-
vival stra tegy for Southern soul.
Bridges s ings about its classic topics in
songs that ta ke their time and revel in
natural, unvarnished singin g. He
pledges sensual roma nce in "Magno-
lias," does some chea tin g (with duet
vocals from Atia Boggs) in "Don't
Wor ry About Me" a nd affirms his faith
In a n agreement negotiated this
s pring, much of Be rlin's collection of Be-
nin Bronzes, which were set to be exhib-
ited in the building, is to be returned to
Nigeria next year. But the process of de-
ciding wha t the Forum should do a bout
ite ms with more a mbiguous histories is
likely to be a messier e ndea vor. On July
20, whe n the museum ope ned, pro-
testers gathe red outside, cha nting slo-
gans like "Defunct the Humboldt For-
um."
The opening week was the first oppor-
tunity for curators to present wha t they
argue is a forward-thinking a nd inclu-
s ive manne r of showing a rtifacts with
colonial associa tions to a broad a udi-
e nce. Although the Humboldt Forum
in "Born Again." Around h im, the
music uses synthetic textures, pro-
grammed bea ts a nd surreal layering to
carry a decades-old tradition into the
21st century.
"Sweeter," which Bridges released in
June 2020 after the police murder of
George Floyd, draws grace from
mourning. T he na rrator is a dead ma n
with his mother, sisters and brothers
weeping over him. "I thought we
moved on from the darker days,"
Bridges sings, over a pa ttering trap
beat a nd Te r race Martin's measured
electr ic-pia no chords; he adds, "Some-
one should ha nd you a felony/Because
you stole from me my chance to be."
"I cannot a nd will not be silent a ny
longer," Bridges said in a sta teme nt at
the time. "Just as Abel's blood was
crying out to God, George Floyd is
crying out to me."
Br idges, 32, has worked his way
forward through soul-music history.
His firs t album, "Coming Home" in
2015, introduced a singer atte nding to
a n era well before he was born. His
voice recalled the sua vity of Sam
Cooke a nd the g rit of Otis Re dding , and
his music was una bashedly revivalist
1960s soul. Br idges moved the timeline
forward with "Good Thing" in 2018,
invoking 1980s "quiet stor m" R&B and
held its official ope ning ceremony online
in Decembe r, pa ndemic restr ictions
have forced it to remain closed to the
public until now. Some have a rgued that
the prolonged closure might have been
to its adva ntage, g iving ad ministrators
longer to resolve some of the $825 mil-
lion building 's technical proble ms.
In May, the Stiddeutsche Zeitung
newspa per cited a confide ntial memo
from the project's head of construction,
Ha ns-Dieter Hegner, which said tha t the
systems ma naging the building's air-
conditioning a nd secur ity ala r ms were
11
s till in a very bad sta te," a nd that con-
tinuing defects "enda nger the cultural
a rtifacts that had already been in-
stalled."
1990s neo-soul.
Both albums reached the Billboa rd
Top 10, but they le ft t he impression
tha t Bridges was still doing genre
studies, trying on established styles.
"Gold-Diggers Sound" - na med
after the Los Angeles studio whe re the
album was made - is more confide ntly
single-minded. All of its songs are
In a n inte rview this month, the Hum-
boldt Forum's director, Hartmut Dorger-
loh, said that he was acutely aware of
the delicateness of some of the ivory
ite ms, which require careful monitoring
of te mperature, humidity and light, and
can develop cracks if conditions change
too fast. " It's dema nding from a conser-
vation point of view,'' he said. "We are
exhibiting 40,000-year-old items in
Be rlin for the first time, in a building
that's been a round for less tha n 10
years." But he emphasized tha t the cli-
mate-control syste m in the a rea where
midtempo or slowe r, ofte n verging on
la nguid. Gently coiling, reverb-laden
electric-guitar vamps, from Nate Me r-
cereau, turn many of the songs into
meditations, a nd all of the tracks, no
ma tte r how much is going on unde r the
surface, defer to Bridges's voice. Al-
though the writing credits a re full of
collaborations - including pop song
the ite ms are being exhibited was fully
functional a nd that no items we re in
danger. "The climate in this a rea is very
sta ble," he said.
Dorger loh said that the show was an
a ppropriate way of ope ning the Hum-
boldt Forum because it reflected his goal
of "creating a space in which we can
sha re experie nces," ra ther than me rely
depicting cultures.
Fea tur ing a bout 200 items - includ-
ing nume rous s pectacula r pieces of jew-
elry, orna te sculptures a nd one of the
world's oldest preserved musical instru-
On "Gold-Diggers Sound," Leon Bridges
explores classic topics in songs that take
their time and revel in natural singing.
doctors like Da n Wilson a nd J ustin
Tranter - the songs present Bridges
as a lonely figure in a desola te space,
pleading and promising.
Bridges a nd his producer s, Ricky
Reed a nd Me rcereau, have clearly
heard the slow grooves of D'Angelo,
Prince, R. Kelly, Marvin Gaye a nd
Smokey Robinson. But there's a differ-
ent, mela ncholy s ide to Br idges's songs
a nd his v oice: less assurance, more
ache.
--
An ostrich egg on elephant tusks in " Ter-
rible Beauty." One of the curators said the
team felt it was important to include
voices from the items' countries of origin.
me nts, a n ivory fl ute - the exhibition
was orga nized in collaboration with the
Na tional Museums of Kenya, among
others . In a d rama tic touch , the s pace
has been pa inted red and interspe rsed
with loudspea kers playing the sound of
a dying elepha nt's breathing. Alongside
the ivory objects, the show also features
a rtifacts depicting colonial exploitation
a nd mistreatment, a nd video monitors
featuring inte rviews with people whose
lives are affected by the ivory trade, in-
cluding a Kenyan park ra nge r a nd a sa-
fari guide.
Albe rto Saviello, one of the show's
three cura tors, said in a n interview that
his team felt it was important to include
voices from the ite ms' countries of ori-
gin and a respons ibility to tell the ob-
jects ' stories, which "are ofte n about in-
justice a nd violence."
Saviello explained tha t although none
of the institutions lending objects for the
exhibition - including the Metropolitan
Museum of Art in New York a nd the Vic-
toria a nd Albe rt Museum in London -
had any concer ns a bout climate-control
issues in the exhibition space, some had
reservations about the show's critical
tone. "We are not doing this in a classical
aesthe tic context that emphasizes the
beauty of the works," he said. "T he re
were concerns we were saying, 'If you
display ivory anywhere, it's a crime.'"
Ultimately, Dorgerloh said, the cura-
tors were a ble to convince concerned
lenders with argume nts about the exhi-
bition's educational importance.
Although public interest in the exhibi-
tion is strong, with all visitor slots re-
served until the end of the month, the re-
action in the German media has been
mixed. The Stiddeutsche Zeitung ar-
gued that the exhibition, which mostly
features artifacts made in Europe,
seemed like a n attempt to dis tract from
the debate a bout giving back disputed
ite ms set to be displayed in the building.
RBB, a regional broadcaste r, said that
the cura tors had brought a "striking, il-
lumina ting a pproach to a complex sub-
ject,'' a nd tha t the exhibition was "im-
pressive in its diver sity."
Visitors were similarly d ivided. Niko-
la us Sonne, 74, a re tired galle rist, said
tha t he was impressed by the building,
but unde rwhelmed by the e xhibition.
"These are incredible objects, but it's too
much a t once," he said.
"It might be be tter if t hey d id a sepa-
rate exhibition about all the bad things
related to it," Sonne added.
Nika Goloma, 48, felt that the show's
concept had been well chosen. "So ma ny
people have been talking" a bout the
Forum's colonial baggage, she said,
"and this s hows tha t from the beginning,
they aren't afraid to show it a nd say,
' Look a t it.' " Though, she added, "I think
they had no other choice."
He's still a sweet talker, offe ring his
lovers not only pleasure but also
deeper empa thy. In "Motorbike," over
a calmly plinking, African-tinged
groove, he insists, " Don't mean no
pressure/ I just wanna make you feel
right." A guitar vamps serenely in
" Details" as he worries a bout a pa rtner
finding someone else; he reminds her
how closely he's paid atte ntion to " How
you look in the car when I'm driving a
Iii fast/ How you pause when you talk
when you're trying not to laugh."
Throug hout the a lbum, Bridges
dares to admit how needy he is. "Why
Don't You Touch Me" has the kind of
ticking, undulating backdrop that
a nother singe r might use for a n under-
stated come-on. But Br idges's song
sees the passion ebbing out of his
rela tionship, wonde rs w ha t he mig ht
have done wrong a nd e nds up beg-
ging: "Girl, make me feel wanted/
Don't leave me out here unfulfilled."
And Bridges e nds the album not with
romantic bliss, but with "Blue Mesas,''
which confesses to a lin gering depres-
s ion that hasn't been cha nged by suc-
cess. It's a contemporary choice -
unexpectedly in line with the brooding
sin g•rap of songwrite rs like Polo G a nd
Rod Wave. For Bridges, soul's history
is still unfolding.
 CULTURE

Drawing out son1e extra laughs

Halen recalls vibra nt contemporary a ni-
A new comedy special mated TV shows like "Steven Unive rse."
The idea, Franklin e xplained, was to
puts an animated spin "visually delight and sur pr ise you
on Tig Notaro's stand-up throughout the 55 minutes."
"Doing the e ntire thing in a singula r
BY GABE COHN
style would exha ust an a udie nce," he
added.
One day d uring the production of her Incorporating many styles was a
new, animated sta nd-up special, Tig No- practical decision, too - they could
taro was presented with a rough illus- more easily divide the labor a mong dif-
trated version of an anecdote about her fere nt artists. (The Los Angeles studio
double mastectomy. In the bit, Notaro Six Point Harness, where Franklin is a
ponders what her doctors might have creative director, took the lead. The stu-
done with her discarded breasts after dio worked with professionals around
the surgery she underwent following a the globe, including a rtists in Australia,
2012 cancer diagnosis. What if, she asks, Nepal, India a nd Mexico.)
the remains had been tossed in a Holly- The result is a special in which each
wood dumpster? Might they have been new bit has a distinct vis ual e nergy, mir-
left for rode nts to play tug of war with? roring the way comics might adjust
The roug h animation added an irrev- their own energy a nd pacing bit to bit.
erent detail of its own: a car speeding by The tra nsitions, though, are sometimes
the dumpster in the night, thoughtlessly quicker than they would be in real life -
fla tte ning Nota ro's forgotten flesh . a result of one of Franklin's more coun-
"They had drawn a tire track going ter intuitive decisions.
over my boob," Notaro said. "The a udie nce was laughing so long
She loved it. But perhaps, s he told her that I had to cut down some of the la ugh-
director, Greg Franklin, the image could ing," Fra nklin said. "Tig kind of bristled
use one more detail to take it from good at that. She's like, ' I'm not used to re-
to great. She had a n idea. moving laughter from my work.' "
"I was like, 'Wha t if there's a little milk Animation allowed Fra nklin and No-
that comes out when it's run over ?' " ta ro the flexibility to s plice in material
The a nimators added some lactose. from different sets . That included the fi-
"Tig Nota ro: Dra wn," available on nale, whe n Nota ro tells a story in which
HBO a nd HBO Max, is new te rritory for she imagines herself and two friends dy-
Nota ro. It does not contain a single live- ing in a car crash. (The punchline in-
volves Dolly Parton and a ca r stereo.)
That section was the hardest, Franklin
said, in part because of the Pixar-like
style he chose. This was born out of a
conversation he had with Notaro about
Pixar being "kind of an unca nny valley
situa tion."

"A cute cartoon character going

through a tragedy is something
that you can empathize with
almost to a ridiculous degree."

If you look a t some of the characters in

action frame. Instead, it's a fully a ni-
mated 55-minute special. The a udio
comes from sets that were recorded, but
not filmed, at the Largo comedy club in
Los Angeles from 2015 to 2020. While it's
far from the fir st sta nd-up project to
promin ently feature anima tion - the
mid-2000s Comedy Central series
"Shorties Watchin' Shorties" was built
a round animated sta nd-up bits, a nd the
comedian David Huntsberger 's more re-
cent special "One-Headed Beast" incor-
porated animation, too - it's certainly
novel, particularly given its le ngth .
Nota ro, 50, is known for her gallows
humor. The 2012 s tand-up set that made
he r a sta r focused on he r cancer diagno-
s is, a nd her work since the n has includ-
ed the Amazon series "One Mississippi,"
a comedy about grief. (She has ta ke n
some more serious film a nd TV roles re-
cently, too, including parts in "Star Trek :
Discovery" a nd the Zack Snyder movie
"Army of the Dead.")
In some ways, Nota ro's deadpa n s tyle
might seem like a n odd fit for a nimation.
(Indeed, "deadpan" a nd "animated" are
nearly a ntonyms.) But Notaro saw the
iJlustrated approach as a tool to help
viewers digest he r personal, sometimes
delibe rately uncomfortable a necdotes.
The visuals do some of the same work
tha t a club or theater setting does, eas-
At left and top, scenes from Tig Notaro's new animated special, " Drawn," which is built
around audio from her live shows. Notaro, above, saw the illustrated approach as a tool
to help viewers digest her personal, sometimes delibera tely uncomfortable anecdotes.
ing a udie nces into a s tate of mind that
allows them to la ugh at a de ta il tha t, in
differe nt circumsta nces, would make
the m recoil.
"The a nimation really elevates it to
this fun - obviously cartoon - ve rsion
of wha t really ha ppened," Nota ro said. "I
think it'll help make people not feel as
sensitive to the ma terial."
The animation can cut the othe r way,
too.
As Fra nklin, the director, said, "Seeing
a cute cartoon characte r going through a
tragedy is something that you can empa-
thize with almost to a ridiculous degree."
Fra nklin came to the project with
years of expe rience animating sta nd-up,
albeit in shorter for ms. In 2010, he was
hired by the comedian Kyle Kinane for a
three-minute bit a bout a pair of bunnies
having sex. ("Visually, 1 thought there
was some fun that could be had with
that;' Franklin noted.) Short animated
videos for other comics, including Wyatt
Cenac a nd Jackie Kashia n, came next.
Notaro saw the Kashian video a nd ad-
mired the way Fra nklin was able to in-
sert his own humor without ste pping on
Kashia n's delivery.
"I loved the comedy that he put be-
tween the jokes - he found his own
joke," Notaro said. "And it didn't feel like
too much , or like it was ta kin g away. It
felt like it was all adding to these bits."
While "Drawn" has the flavor of a
Covid-e ra idea - no audie nces were
ha rmed in the animating of this special
- it was actually set in motion before
the pand emic started. Whe n they first
talked of collaborating, Nota ro's now-fa-
mous 2012 set hadn't ha ppened yet, a nd
she had no network or studio to pay for
such a project. She hired Franklin years
la te r, in la te 2019, a nd ha nded him a bout
48 hours of recorded performa nces to
consider for the special.
The a pproach they settled on involved
a constantly changing style so that each
bit gets its own look. An anecdote a bout
"J urassic Pa rk;' for exa mple, uses Clay-
mation. The visuals for a story a bout
wisdom teeth removal were inspired by
magazine illustrations from the 1960s
a nd '70s. And a bit involving Eddie Van
"Coco," Fra nklin said, they look like car-
toons but have human skin with pores
a nd reflect light the way skin does "in a
way that, ultimately, is kind of odd.'' He
a nd Notaro got to talking a bout it, he
said : "I was kind of curious about seeing
a Pixar character bleed to death.''
By the time the cartoon Notaro a nd
frie nds die in the ca r crash, several like-
nesses of her in mortal distress have al-
ready appea red, including one who has
pneumonia, then develops a gastro-
intestinal diseas e, then is diagnosed
with cancer.
Tha t visual gag goes a step past No-
taro's actual words. In the bit, Notaro de-
scribes he r situation getting "worse a nd
worse a nd worse a nd worse," with the
a nimation growing more dire on each
beat. With the final "worse," an urn with
a n image of Nota ro appears. She didn't
know before ha nd a bout that detail. But
she was comfortable with it.
"I think because I feel so connected to
that reality, it almost felt good a nd r ight
for tha t to be in the re," Notaro said. "If
a nyone wants to know, I want to be cre-
ma ted," she added. "So the artists we re
right on."
Notaro was more directly involved in
the development of the animated im-
ages of herself, which went through
ma ny rough ite rations.
"It's a long process of saying, ' I like
this one, but I like the nose on this one
be tter, and maybe throw in option No. 3's
hair,'" Notaro said.
She gave notes, but also asked her
wife, Ste pha nie Allynne, to weigh in
with an outs ide pe rspective on the accu-
racy. "It 's hard to fully see your self;' No-
ta ro explained, "whethe r you're a ni-
ma ted or not."

Walk this way

BOOK REVIEW
The Appalachia n Trail: A Biography
By Philip D'Anieri. Illustrated. 262 pp.
Houghton Mifflin Harcour t. $26.
BY JONATHAN MILES
In "On Trails: An Exploration," Robe rt
Moor's sinuous medita tion on the the-
ory a nd practice of na ture trails, Moor
wrote tha t he used to wonde r about the
a uthorship of the unmarked footpa ths
he'd e ncounter in the woods or in city
pa rks. Just who had decided tha t this
route was the optimal course from he re
to the re? The a nswer, Moor concluded,
was no one. No one had authored the
pa th - but also everyone had. "Some-
one made a stab a t a proble m," Moor
explained, "took a te nta tive trip, a nd
the next person followed, a nd the n
a nothe r, subtly improving the route
along the way."
Moor's line wor ks as a passable plot
summa ry for P hilip D'Anie ri's "The
Appalachian Trail : A Biography." The
Appalachia n Trail, nicknamed the A.T.,
is a footpath running roughly 2,190
miles up a nd dow n the Eastern United
States, from Georgia's Springer Moun-
tain to Maine's Mount Kata hdin. Three
million people follow its painted trail
blazes a nnually - most for a pleasant
few miles, some for multiday segments,
a fragrant few for its e ntire le ngth.
D'Anieri places himself in the first
group. " 1 am a day-hiker only," he
writes. "Five or six hour s at a stretch,
out a nd back from the comfort of a car."
This suggests what you won't find in
this book: intima te desc riptions of foot
blisters or ultralight pack technology,
rhapsodies on the wild ponies of Mount
Rogers or the white sprays of blood-
root flowers along the s pringtime trail,
or examina tions of slackpackers, yel-
low blazers, trail a ngels or any othe r
s ubsets of A.T. culture. D'A nie ri, a
lecture r in a rchitecture and regional
pla nning a t the Univer sity of Michigan,
pins his gaze on a larger, longer vista:
why the Appalachian Trail e xists a nd
how it came to be.
To the la tte r e nd, he profiles a cross-
section of the organizers, visionaries,
bureaucrats, promote rs, pla nners,
hikers, wr iters a nd politician s who
brought the Appalachia n Trail into
existence - made a stab a t a problem,
in Moor's formula tion - or nurtured
its developme nt along the way.
"Telling the story of the Appalachia n
Trail," D'Anie ri w rites, " means telling a
story of people.'' If the A.T. were a
musical, this would be its playbill.
Among its dozen leading c ha racte r s,
most of them siloed in ind ividual chap-
ters, is Arnold Guyot, the 19th-century
Swiss geographe r who first mapped
the eastern highla nds, a nd Be nton
MacKaye, widely regarded as the
trail's mastermind , who a century ago
proposed the concept in a n architectur-
al journal. Ea rl Shaffe r a nd Emma
Gatewood, two of the earliest hike rs to
trek the entire leng th (in the 1940s and
'50s, respectively) , share a chapter.
The Wisconsin senator Gaylord Nel-
son, who s pearheaded legisla tion in
the 1960s providing federal protection
for the route, also gets one. Bill Bryson
does, too, for the effect that his 1998
best seller, "A Walk in the Woods," had
on the trail.
Each biogra phical capsule is, of
course, only as fascina ting as the life it
recounts; which is to say, your mileage
may vary. The passage of a bill through
Congress, or of a re port through fed-
eral agencies, can be as slow a nd
trudgy as a hike throug h some of the
A.T.'s Pe nnsylva nia sections. On the
other hand , the story of a 66-year-old
Appalachia n grandmother (that's
Gatewood), surv ivor of a three-dec-
ades-long abusive ma rriage, who
impulsively decides to become the first
woma n to thru-hike the trail alone,
with only sneakers and a duffel for
gear, is nothing short of rousing, a
soul-poppe r. ("I thought it would be a
nice la rk," Gatewood said afterward.
" It was n't." Still, she did it two more
times.) D'Anie ri is a steady, level guide
to these lives. A onetime radio reporter,
he tends to conclude his chapter s the
way obituary segments often wrap up
on NPR. I couldn't avoid hearing Ari
Shapiro's voice, soft a nd reverent,
when a chapter cha racte ristically
closed : "He was 96 years old."
Aside from Gatewood and Pam
Unde rhill, a U.S. Pa rk Service official
who was instrume ntal in acquiring
Philip D'Anieri.
la nd for the trail corridor, D'Anie ri's
cast is a n all-male revue, and all white
males a t that - something D'Anieri
addresses a t the outset. T his composi-
tion, he writes, "roughly captures the
ma ke up of the broade r cast of cha rac-
ters in the trail's developme nt over the
years.'' The "invention, construction
a nd protection of the A.T. was a project
fir mly grounded in Ame r ica's white
middle class, responsive to its needs
a nd reflective of its wor ldvie w. In this
respect, unfortuna tely, the A.T. is a n
accurate representa tion of much of
America's environmental history."
D'Anie ri is sensitive to this historical
monochrome. Still, excluded from his
ske tch of Guyot a re the geographe r 's
crackpot Aryanist theories a bout racial
geography a nd his esteem for his own
white race as "the most pure, the most
perfect type of huma nity." Absent from
D'Anie ri's portrait of Myron Avery, as
well, is the early trail organizer's 1940
recomme ndation for a Virginia seg-
ment whe re the "racial stock was re-
puted to be perhaps the purest Anglo-
Saxon in the eastern Atlantic s tates."
One might argue, I suppose, that
Guyot 's r acist theories a ren't explicitly
relevant to his intersection with the
history of the Appalachia n Mountains,
a nd tha t Avery, born in 1899, was pa r-
roting his e ra. But one must also con-
tend - and D'Anieri does do this, if
fleetingly, in his final fi rst-pe rson cha p-
ter - with the fact tha t, according to
surveys by the hiking website The
Trek, roughly 95 perce nt of A.T. thru-
hike rs identify as white. It's a cor rela-
tive spur warranting far more explora-
tion.
"The p laces we choose, and the way
we the n develop a nd manage the m,"
D'Anie ri writes, "tell us a lot about
wha t we are as king from na ture, what
exactly we think we are traveling to-
ward a nd escaping from."
The problem that the Appalachia n
Trail's ear liest founder s were taking a
sta b at was, in the words of the outdoor
writer a nd A.T. guiding light Horace
Ke phart, "the nerve-strain a nd bodily
exhaustions that a re the penalties of a
hurrying, high-tensioned civilization.''
The idea stemmed , the n, from much
the same outdoor-air movement that
gave us summe r ca mps, scouting a nd
forested urba n parklands: an effo rt to
connect Ame ricans with wha t Aldous
Huxley called the " not-self.'' T he trait's
founde rs saw it as a kind of pressure
relief valve for stressed urba nites,
"refuge not only from noise a nd
s mokestacks," as D'Anier i sharply
notes, "but from the less refi ned a nd
the lower class." A ne twork of wood-
lands, they believed, could act as a
buffer against the strains - s piritual,
physical, social, aesthe tic, ecological -
of industrial-era life.
But "even in the trail's earliest days,"
as D'Anieri writes , "imagining a pr is-
tine alpine realm required not-seeing
the native history of the Appalachi-
a ns." The trail has always, then, bee n a
noble contrivance. "Isolating the trail
from the cha nge all around it meant
carving out a na rrow strip of exclusion
from the actual la ndscape, an exercise
not just in preservation," D'Anieri
writes, "but illusion."
This is not to depreciate the achieve-
me nt of the Appalachia n Trail, or the
magic it daily confe rs on hiker s up a nd
down its vast le ngth. It is only to say -
as D'Anie ri's stalwa rt biography ma kes
clear - that the work of humans, even
a me re ribbon of dirt along a n a ncient
ridgeline, will always bea r the contra-
dictions and complications of those
whose hands - a nd feet - made it.
Jonatha n Miles is the author of three
novels, most recently ''Anatomy of a
Miracle."
LIVING
Skewering, the fast and easy ways
Grilling food on a stick
is diverse and satisfying,
but it can be tricky too
BY MELISSA CLARK
It's one of the most elemental cooking
techniques: impaling food on a s kewer
or a stick and cooking it over an open
fire.
With iterations found throughout the
world - the kebabs of the Middle East,
the a nticuchos of South America , the
yakitori of Japan and the suya of Ni-
geria , to name a few - grilling food on
skewers is a widespread practice that's
as richly diverse as it is satisfying.
As any distracted s'mores make r who
has incinerated a marshmallow knows,
it can also be one of the trickiest activi-
ties to do well. With grilling season in
full swing, now is the perfect time to run
through some of its finer points.
CHOOSE THE RIGHT SKEWERS
Any thin rod with a sharp end
whether it's the swords of Turkish sol-
dier s cooking thei r suppers on the bat-
tlefield (an oft-told tale, reflecting how
the "shish" in "shish kebab" m ean s
"sword" or "skew er"), or tree branches
foraged at campsites and destined for
hot dogs - can be used as a skew er.
But there are plenty of m ore easily ob-
tained options, including those made
from m etal , and those m ade from wood,
usually bam boo.
Bamboo skewer s ar e i nexpensive,
biodegradable an d w on't burn your
g uest s' lips. You'll need to soak them for
at least 30 minutes before u sing, so they
don't flame up on the grill. I like to repur-
pose a rimmed sheet p an for this; just
add the sk ew er s and cover them w ith
water. But a ver y large bowl or roasti ng
pan w ill al so work.
Metal skewer s have the ad vantage of
being highly sturdy and reusable, and,
w hen made from stainless steel , dish-
wash er safe. Fl at, wide skewers will
keep y our ingr edients from slipping as
y ou turn them, and I find that those w ith
big, looped han dl es are the easi est to
grasp.
Skewers com e in a var iety of sizes.
The 12- to 14-inch lengths are a good bet,
as they're long enough to hold a lot of
food, yet sm all enough to fit in your
k i tch en drawer s. For hors d'oeuvres,
si x-inch bamboo or wooden sk ewer s ar e
just right. (Metal skewers get too hot.)
CONSIDER THE INGREDIENTS
A nything you'd cook over direct heat
w ill work well on a skewer ; just avoid
tough cuts of m eats that are better for
br aising or for sl ow, indirect barbecuing,
and dense vegetables like potatoes and
other roots, and winter squash.
Cut your ingredients into small, uni-
form pieces, usually one to two inch es.
And although it looks festive to h ave di f-
ferent ingr edients lined up on the sam e
sk ewer, resi st the urge. Those colorfully
striped meal s-on-a-stick are hard to con-
trol and much more likely to cook un-
evenly. Better to stack similar ingredi-
en ts on the sam e skewer so all the pieces
are don e at the same time.
L eaving a little space (about a quarter
of an inch) b etween th e chunks w ill help
brown things more th oroughly and en-
courage crisp edges. This is especially
helpful for vegetables that need to re-
lease a lot of moisture as they grill, such
as eggplant, zucchini and onions.
On the flip side, for fish, chicken
breasts and oth er ingredi ents that have
a tendency to dr y out, pressing the
cubes together insulates them slightly,
helping retain t heir juices.
Bigger chunks, i rregularly sh aped in-
g redi en ts like shrimp, or delicate things
such as tofu can ben efit from usi ng two
parallel sk ewers, w hich keep th e tidbits
from r otating w h en turning .
MAKE MARINATING A GOAL
Many of the world's great sk ewered
dishes call for a pungent m arinade, like
lemongrass-l aced Thai satay or oniony
Russian sh ashlik. M arinating hel ps sea-
son them thoroughly, adding loads of fla-
vor.
You can marinate your ingredients a
few hours ahead or the day befor e,
w hich makes things go ver y quickly
when you're ready to grill - a boon for
entertaining. But even on a weeknight, a
quick stint i n a heady m arinade can do
wonder s. When you're pressed for time,
start marinating your ingredients while
your g r ill heats up. A s little as 10 min-
utes can m ak e a difference.
And if you don't want to marinate,
g ive everything a spr inkle of sal t and a
slick of oil to help keep things from stick-
ing.
TURN AND SERVE
The closer the sk ewer s are to th e heat ,
th e more you need to turn them to m ak e
sure th ey cook evenly. This i s w here
your skewer handles are i mportant -
the lar ger th ey are, the easier they are to
g rasp. Grilling gl oves can h el p you m a-
neuver things safely.
On ce you're ready to ser ve, you'll
wan t to rem ove th e food from the skew-
er s. Whil e you could use a fork, a soft
piece of flatbr ead adds flair - and
m ak es a tasty cook's treat.
FISH SKEWERS WITH HERBS
llNDLIME
TIME: 20 MINUTES, PLUS GRILL HEATING
YIELD: 4 SERVINGS
2 garlic cloves, finely grated,
pressed or minced
1 t ablespoon fish sauce
¼ teaspoon red-pepper flakes
3 t ablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
1 pound thick, dense fish steaks,
such as tuna or swordfish, cut into
1 ½ -inch pieces
Lime wedges, for serving
2 scallions, white and green parts,
trimmed and thinly sliced
½ cup chopped dill, mint, parsley,
cilantro or a combination
COCONUT-PINEAPPLE SKEWERS
WITH MARSHMALLOWS
TIME: 15 MINUTES, PLUS GRILL HEATING
YIELD: 4 SERVINGS
1 pound fresh pineapple, cut into
1 ½ -inch cubes (about 2 cups)
2 tablespoons coconut oil
Ground cinnamon
2 cups mini m arshmallows
Sweetened shredded coconut, for
garnish
Coconut sorbet or ice cream, for
serving (optional)
Toasted chopped pecans, for
garnish (optional)
1. Heat the grill to high. As the grill is
heat ing, thread pineapple chunks onto
metal or pre-soaked bamboo skewers (see
Tip), leaving space in between each piece
1. Heat the grill to high. In a mixing bowl,
combine garlic, fish sauce and red-pepper
flakes. Whisk in oil. Add fish cubes and
gently toss to evenly coat. Let marinate
while the grill heats up.
2. Thread marinated fish onto metal or
pre-soaked bamboo skewers (see Tip).
pushing them up so they touch. This keeps
them from overcooking.
3. When the grill is hot, lightly brush the
grates with oil and add the skewers. Cook
until slightly charred in places, about 2 to
4 minutes, rotating them carefully halfway
through.
4 . Transfer to a serving platter, and
immediately squeeze 2 or 3 lime wedges
on top of the fish while still hot. Garnish
fish with scallions and herbs, and serve
with more lime wedges on the side.
for maximum browning. Brush all sides of
the pineapple chunks w ith coconut oil and
dust w ith cinnamon.
2. When the grill is hot, lightly brush the
grates with oil, and add the pineapple
skewers. Cook, rotating them carefully
every few m inutes, until they are evenly
browned and slightly charred in places,
about 4 to 8 minutes.
3. While the pineapple is grilling, divide
marshmallows across 4 bowls. Remove
pineapple from the grill and, using a fork,
immediately slide the pineapple off the
skewers and onto the marshmallows. Let
sit for a few minutes for the hot pineapple
to soften the marshmallows.
4 . Sprinkle each serving with shredded
coconut, and top with pecans and small
scoops of coconut sorbet or ice cream, if
using.
CHEESE SKEWERS WITH SMOKY
PAPRIKA
TIME: 20 MINUTES, PLUS GRILL HEATING
YIELD: 4 SERVINGS
2 tablespoons minced shallot
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
¾ teaspoon smoked sweet paprika
¼ teaspoon hot paprika or ground
cayenne
¼ teaspoon ground coriander or
cumin
SUMMER VEGETABLE SKEWERS
TIME: 25 MINUTES, PLUS GRILL HEATING
YIELD: 4 TO 6 SERVINGS
2 pounds zucchini or eggplant , or a
combination, cut into 1-inch cubes
Fine sea salt
2 fat garlic cloves, finely grated,
pressed or minced
2 tablespoons m inced fresh oregano
or marjoram
¼ teaspoon red-pepper flakes
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus
more for serving
Lemon wedges, for serving
Flaky sea salt, for serving
1. Heat the grill to high. With a colander
set in the sink, lightly sprinkle the eggplant
or zucchini with a little salt. Toss well and
set aside for 10 minutes.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine garlic,
oregano and red-pepper flakes. Whisk in
oil. Pat vegetables dry with a clean kitchen
towel or paper towels, and add to the
bowl. Gently toss to coat. Let marinate
while the grill heats up.
3. Thread vegetables onto metal or
pre-soaked bamboo skewers, keeping the
eggplant and zucchini on separate
skewers, if using both vegetables. Reserve
any leftover marinade at the bottom of
bowl.
4. When the grill is hot, add the skewers.
Cook, rotating them carefully every few
minutes, until evenly browned and slightly
charred in places, about 7 to 12 minutes.
Transfer to a serving platter. Brush with
remaining marinade and squeeze a lemon
wedge all over. Sprinkle with flaky sea salt
and serve.
Fine sea salt {optional)
8 ounces grilling cheese, such as
halloum i, provolone, kefalotyri,
queso panela or bread cheese, cut
into 1-inch cubes and patted dry
1. Heat the grill to high. In a m ixing bowl,
combine shallot, oil, spices and a small
pinch of salt , if you like. (Most grilling
cheese is already pretty salty; taste it
first.) Add cheese and gently toss to evenly
coat. Let marinate for a few minutes while
the grill heats up.
SPICED GROUND MEAT SKEWERS
TIME: 30 MINUTES, PLUS GRILL HEATING AND AT
LEAST 2 HOURS' CHILLING
YIELD: 4 SERVINGS
1 pound cold ground meat , such as
lamb, beef, turkey or a
combination
1/3 cup finely m inced or grated white
onion
2 garlic cloves, finely grated,
pressed or m inced
2 t ablespoons finely chopped fresh
cilantro or parsley, plus more for
garnish
1 ¼ t easpoons ground c umin
1 teaspoon ground sumac (see Tip),
plus more for serving
1 teaspoon kosher salt (Diamond
Crystal)
1 teaspoon Urfa or Aleppo pepper
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black
pepper
1/s teaspoon ground cinnamon
(optional)
Flaky sea salt, for garnish
1. In a large mixing bowl, combine the
meat, onion, garlic, cilantro, cumin,
sumac, salt, Urfa pepper, black pepper,
and cinnamon, if using.
2. With your hands, thoroughly knead and
massage the meat to incorporate the
ingredients, about 4 minutes. Breaking
down the meat will create a sticky,
cohesive mixture that results in a pleasing
springy texture. You can also combine
everything in an electric mixer with the
paddle attachment, in which case it will
take only about 2 minutes. Chill the
mixture for at least 2 hours or up to
overnight.
3 . Wet your hands w ith cold water, then
divide meat into 6 equal portions and mold
each around a metal or pre-soaked
bamboo skewer. Transfer skewers to a
large plate or baking sheet. You can grill
them right away at this point, or cover and
refrigerate them while preparing the grill
(up to 4 hours).
4. Heat the grill to high. When the grill is
hot, lightly brush the grates with oil, and
add the skewers. Cook, rotating them
carefully every few minutes, unt il evenly
browned and slightly charred in places,
about 5 to 10 minutes. Transfer to a
platter and let rest for a few minutes.
Garnish with flaky sea salt and more herbs
and sumac, and serve.
Tip: If you can't find ground sumac, use 1
teaspoon finely grated lemon zest instead.
The flavor won't be the same, but the
lemon will provide the needed tartness.
2. Pierce c heese onto metal skewers or
pre-soaked bam boo skewers (see Tip),
about 3 to 4 per skewer. Reserve any
leftover m arinade at the bottom of bowl.
3. When the grill is hot, brush the grates
lightly with oil and add the skewers. Cook,
rotating them carefully every few minutes,
until evenly browned and slightly charred
in places, about 3 to 8 minutes. Transfer
to a serving platter and brush with
remaining marinade. Serve immediately.