In the New Yorker...

[Jeff Wrangler]

So Elizabeth Holmes is now in jail. I remember some years ago she was profiled in TNY when she first came out with her Theranos fraud.

[serious crayons]

Profiled without the writer knowing it was fraud? Bummer.

[Jeff Wrangler]

So Elizabeth Holmes is now in jail. I remember some years ago she was profiled in TNY when she first came out with her Theranos fraud.

Profiled without the writer knowing it was fraud? Bummer.

She had everyone bamboozled. I've been wondering if TNY would be doing some sort of follow-up. So far, no. Maybe after she's been in jail for a while. Or not.

One of the "procedurals"--it may have been the reboot of Law & Order--had an episode that was clearly inspired by the Holmes case. Everything was there: A woman running a huge company that was a scam, then trying to claim she was an abused woman. Being L&O, they added a murder into the mix, but everything else just screamed Elizabeth Holmes.

[serious crayons]

I liked the May 29 Shouts and Murmurs by Simon Rich. It's not hilarious, but it's poignant -- told from the perspective of a Participation Trophy, which has a metaphorical meaning as well.

I looked up Simon Rich and he looks shockingly young -- like, 17 -- but is actually 38. He has written a bunch of books. He has an older brother who has ALSO written a bunch of books. And their father is the longtime NYT columnist Frank Rich, who has ALSO written a bunch of books as well as produced some award-winning TV series, including the recent Succession.

But then it got even weirder, at least to me. The wife of Frank Rich is a NYT columnist who has ALSO written some books. He is 73; she is 33.

My former governor and his wife, married a few years ago, are about those same ages. However, the ex-governor is one of the richest people in the state; heir to a department-store fortune.

Of course, Frank Rich is also Rich. 

 

[Front-Ranger]

There is so much more in that issue that I want to read, such as the articles about Paul Schrader, Jackie Kennedy, and Waco.

I went back to read the Waco article in the May 8 (Coronation) issue. The author, Daniel Immerwahr, places the roots of the violent 1990s in the fallout from the Vietnam War, and cites the debut of "Cops" in 1989 and "Law & Order" in 1990, for feeding into that strain of violence. Also in that timeframe was an act of Congress allowing unlicensed hobbyists to sell weapons at gun shows, and firearm sales nearly doubled between 1987 and 1993.

Excited to see our Dave Cullen quoted in the article about bombs the Columbine killers planted. Luckily they didn't go off, or 500 people might have died.

[Front-Ranger]

I also want to say something about the Paul Schrader article and quote  from it, but I don't want to if you haven't read it yet and don't want spoilers.

[Jeff Wrangler]

In the article about Stephen Satterfield in the May 29 issue, I was tickled to learn that Thomas Jefferson ate macaroni and cheese. Of course and unfortunately, it was prepared for him by an enslaved man who was his cook, but who knew that macaroni and cheese as a thing went as far back as Jefferson's day?

[Jeff Wrangler]

Anybody read the article about women writers in the June 5 issue?

[serious crayons]

Anybody read the article about women writers in the June 5 issue?

Skimmed it. Tell you what, June 5 is one of the few issues ever that I've managed to throw out while it was still current. And I've got issues going back to July 2022, at least.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Skimmed it. Tell you what, June 5 is one of the few issues ever that I've managed to throw out while it was still current. And I've got issues going back to July 2022, at least.

I skipped more of that issue than I read. Most of those musicians I'd never heard of. I pushed through the Ed Sheeran article, although it got into stuff about music that was totally beyond my comprehension.