White Space, White Noise
... and a Sampler Box of News
Greetings, with a newShrink opening in solidarity with some of those who make journalism (and democracy) happen.
Just a moment’s pause here, for how one day of a news-intensive week can look and feel without them.
White Space, White Noise
New York Times staffers walk out en masse; first time in decades (The Washington Post)
The work stoppage follows months of negotiations over pay and other issues -- and a frustration by union workers that they have not shared the fruits of the company’s recent success.
The dispute comes as several media companies are laying off employees, citing a challenging economic environment. The Times, though, is widely considered one of the industry’s rare success stories. Executives said in their latest earnings call that they had grown the newsroom and projected a total adjusted operating profit of between $320 million and $330 million by the end of the year.
Some staffers argue that they should share more of the fruits of this recent success, after enduring stagnant wages and belt-tightening during leaner times for the company.
“That’s where it feels more than just a matter of disagreement on numbers, but really a slap in the face,” said film critic A.O. Scott. “We have devoted so much of our time, energy, work and love to this paper, which seems unwilling to recognize or to reward that contribution.”
Meredith Kopit Levien, the chief executive of the Times, said Wednesday that the company has shown a “clear commitment” to negotiating a contract “that provides Times journalists with substantial pay increases, market-leading benefits and flexible working conditions.”
Here is The Times’ own coverage:
New York Times Union Holds One-Day Strike (NYT)
Negotiators for the company and the union, which represents most of the newsroom, have failed to come to an agreement on salaries, health and retirement benefits, and other issues
New York Times braces for 24-hour newsroom strike (Associated Press)
Not surprisingly this issue and story are of great concern given the journalism thrust of newShrink’s core mission of looking at news of the day through psychology’s many varied lenses. Future editions will likely examine the state of the industry, particularly newspapers, more broadly and deeply. Today I’ll note only that the solid, robust journalism essential to democracy is not free, but in fact quite expensive. The originally sourced, real thing requires much in costly human labor, expertise and talent; time; equipment; travel; and technology, for just a few examples. Various kinds of aggregators of previously reported content can be well-done, convenient and cost-effective. If you value that content, as personal finances allow, please, please also pay for and support the original news organizations and journalists providing it. And call out employers, especially an unusually profitable one like The Times, to compensate journalists in proportion to that profitability.
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Again with busy season and wide assortment of breaking news in a lot of arenas, the remainder of today’s edition is mainly a sampling of news headlines and links to stories as your interest and time allow, with just a few quotes and comments. A factor this month, affecting newShrink and about every other corner of my life, is the increasingly urgent need to trade in and transition over all from my essential-but-aging jalopy of an iPhone — 6S Plus, 2015 vintage with near-maxed-out storage — for a new one. (More storage, much better camera and access to system updates are a treat. Finding time and focus for the switch, not so much.)
Depending on my tech and holiday-management capabilities, next week’s theme focus will be the coming Solstice — on this year’s calendar also just before the month’s new-moon darkness — from the perspectives of depth/soul psychology, myth and the arts. The two following Sunday editions will incorporate seasonal retrospective themes with news.
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Today’s other title-theme is in tribute, with some tweaking, to iconic film character Forrest Gump and his oft-quoted philosophy, “life is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re going to get.” Reflecting on that second part, a slight amendment came to mind: You never know what you’re going to get… unless the box is a vintage-tradition Whitman’s Sampler. (In which case you have a handy key listing contents of all of the assorted chocolates, mapped to their locations in the box!)
This week instead of the frequent pesky musical ear-worm, the Sampler has been recurring visual-image as photos and other visuals for the illustrations were coming together.
(The evolving multiple-photo collage format in newShrink was originally tech-driven. It began as a way on the Substack platform to include more different illustrations, along with the storage-consuming number of hyperlinks to stories, without triggering anyone’s email provider to truncate/condense any of what you as a reader see on screens.)
A Sampler Box of News
At some point here it made me chuckle that the photo-visuals, illustrating various story-items below, work a bit like the candy-ID-guide in that old-fashioned Whitman’s box. Once that had me, it wouldn’t let go! Hence the photo-, er, cluster here at top center:
Continuing at center column…
Homeward Bound
Brittney Griner released in swap for arms dealer Viktor Bout (WAPO)
WNBA star Brittney Griner has been released from Russian detention in a prisoner swap for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
Inside the Prisoner Swap That Freed Brittney Griner (NYT)
U.S. officials say Moscow had been pushing for the release of a Russian assassin being held in Germany before finally agreeing to release Ms. Griner for Viktor Bout, a Russian arms dealer.
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Pictured at top left...
New Morning in Georgia?
Georgia U.S. Senate Runoff Election Results (NYT)
Senator Raphael Warnock defeated his challenger, Herschel Walker, a former football star and Trump-backed Republican, in the Georgia runoff. The win gave Mr. Warnock, the first Black senator from Georgia, a full six-year term.
GA Senate Runoff Results (The Washington Post)
And on the other side of this race, The Atlantic announces this compelling essay by Carolina Randall Williams as “Herschel Walker’s Candidacy is an Assault on the Dignity of Black Americans.” Williams brings a poignant, stunningly spot-on take on the power-and-race dimensions here:
Herschel Walker Is an American Tragedy (The Atlantic)
Black bodies, white agendas
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Marriage Equality
As reported in the first Washington Post story above about the NYT walkout, this Times reporter found a way to cover the marriage-equality story breaking Thursday without crossing the digital picket line:
“A news alert with my name on it just went out,” reporter Annie Karni tweeted, about her story on the congressional approval of a same-sex marriage bill. “It was a pre-written story ahead of an expected vote. I stand with the guild!”
Bill to Protect Same-Sex Marriage Rights Clears Congress (NYT)
The House gave final approval to the measure, with lawmakers from both parties voting in favor. It now heads to President Biden to be signed into law.
(NC Senator Thom Tillis is pictured at bottom center column.)
NC Republican Senators Tillis, Burr help Senate pass protections for same-sex and interracial marriages (The News and Observer of Raleigh)
Not so, however, for NC Republican House members — including Senator-elect Ted Budd (also pictured at bottom center column):
NC House Republicans vote against same-sex, interracial marriage as bill passes Congress (N&O of Raleigh in the Charlotte Observer)
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At bottom left peerless Charlotte Observer cartoonist Kevin Siers brings concise comedic clarity to arguments this week, in an abstract-sounding U.S. Supreme Court case that has all-too-concrete and sweeping potential effects on US elections.
Kevin Siers: Legislatures Unchecked and Unbalanced
Supreme Court points to a possible Moore v. Harper compromise, and it’s not a good one (The Charlotte Observer, editorial board opinion)
The Supreme Court considers the 'independent state legislature' theory (NPR)
In their own words: Some of the most telling quotes from SCOTUS justices in NC case (Charlotte Observer)
Full transcript from arguments in North Carolina’s Moore v. Harper case (From U.S. Supreme Court website)
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Immigration
Thom Tillis helps craft a flawed — but worthy — immigration compromise (N&O of Raleigh)
Immigration advocates cautiously optimistic about Senate immigration deal (The Hill)
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Evolving Criminal Investigation Development
Trump Organization Found Guilty in Tax Fraud Scheme (NYT)
The former president’s company had been accused of providing off-the-book benefits to executives. The testimony of its former chief financial officer proved crucial to the case.
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(And the antithesis, pictured top right)
Courage, Leadership, Inspiration
TIME Person of the Year 2022: Volodymyr Zelensky and the Spirit of Ukraine
Following last winter/spring’s Russian invasion of Ukraine several newShrink editions focused on both the war and the multi-dimensional and impressive Ukrainian president and first lady. These are: 2.27.22 Preludes, Next Drafts and a Terrible Love of war; 3.13.22 Soul in Place, Soul in Motion and… Typecasting?; and 3.20.22 Wars, Wits and the Transformative Power of Stepping off Script. To find these, and all archived editions, browse to www.newshrink.substack.com.
If you haven’t watched or read much about either or both Zelenskys besides the war and related diplomatic effort, they are a refreshing treat.
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Extremist Attack on NC Power Plant
Here are stories from first-days’ coverage of community-wide crippling of this Moore County sandhills community 66 miles southwest of Raleigh — site of Pinehurst golf resort and the town of Southern Pines.
Nearly 40,000 in the dark as massive power outage hits Moore County; gunfire targeted substations, officials say (CBS local news, Saturday, 12.3.22, and update Sunday, 12.4.22)
Duke Energy says it has completed repairs on N.C. power equipment damaged by shootings (NPR & Associated Press, Wednesday, 12.7.22)
The FBI and the NC State Bureau are assisting in the investigation.
One thread involves the writings by extremists on online forums encouraging attacks on critical infrastructure. The second thread looks at a series of recent disruptions of LGBTQ+ events across the nation by domestic extremists.
Investigators have no evidence… [but] are taking into consideration that the timing of the Moore County shootings – 7 p.m. on a Saturday night – coincided with the time a drag performance sponsored by the local LBGTQ+ community began. Audience members used their phone flashlights to light the stage for one last song, but after that the performance couldn’t continue due to the power outage, according to Sandhills PRIDE.
Pondering such different ways our world, and we, are fragile is daunting indeed at this time of year. Here’s talented Kevin Siers again, expressing that in comic parody:
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And, yet… Considering again those Whitman’s Sampler photos at the top of this section:
Sometimes, a Gold Nugget…
For some Christmas, anniversary or other gift-occasion of my early childhood, my witty-creative dad surprised my mom with the pictured authentic, Fort Knox-style embossed gold nugget (morphed into a pendant).
The “wow, gold jewelry!” aspects of it eluded me.
But the piece has always enchanted and lured in ways that other such things often don’t. In appearance and shiny-cool texture it evokes powerful memory-images of my beloved, ever-generous great-grand Eliza sharing from her ubiquitous Whitman’s Sampler box.
The gold-piece is uncannily similar to my coveted solid-chocolate favorite, always-first-chosen treat (pictured here at top-center.)
The box’s one or two shiny, gold-foil-wrapped delights — with Sampler elegantly embossed on the top — were the first candy locations I would map to the box’s handy key, in hopes I had gotten to them first (ie. before my Poppie.)
Browsing photos for today’s edition turned up only vintage versions of the still-available samplers that had the wrapped-gold solid chocolates. It seems today’s updated Whitman’s may have omitted them.
Which makes the enduring jewelry version a more precious reminder: Sometimes there is, indeed, a gold nugget, as the Knost quote suggests. Not all are, or even desired to be, chocolate.
Sunshine counts, as well — just 10 days until Solstice!
And, that is all I have! Talk to you next week.
🦋💙 tish
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… it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
— William Stafford, “A Ritual to Read to Each Other”
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