Happy New Year, everyone. I had one new piece for subscribers to the Athletic this week, breaking down my Hall of Fame ballot, which went about as well as you might expect. I held a Klawchat on the 23rd.
Over at Paste, I reviewed the game Iberian Gauge, an 18xx game that’s on the shorter side for that genre, and wrote up everything I saw and played at PAX Unplugged this year.
I sent out a new edition of my free email newsletter this week, talking about music and how we consume and categorize it has changed since I first became a big fan of pop music about 40 years ago.
I also appeared on my friend Elliott Garstin’s podcast, Twenty Eyes Radio, to talk about my favorite songs and albums of 2021.
And now, the links…
- Longreads first: Dr. Irene Bosch, a molecular biologist currently at MIT, created a rapid test for COVID-19 in the spring of 2020, and had arranged for its manufacture. Thanks to the FDA, you still can’t get it.
- Dr. Robert Malone is a real scientist who has falsely claimed credit for inventing mRNA vaccines. That’s led him down a path of straight-up vaccine denialism, enough to get him suspended from Twitter this past week.
- COVID-19 denialists like to claim that deaths from the virus are overcounter, but the truth is that they’re significantly undercounted in many counties, based on large spikes in excess deaths that aren’t attributed to the virus for mostly innocuous reasons.
- Did the 76ers just announce a big partnership with a fake company? Defector was unable to find any evidence that the CEO of Color Star is even a real person.
- Wichita juvenile detention center employees murdered a Black teenager in their custody in September by restraining him in the prone position – which police also used to restrain George Floyd when they killed him.
- The Associated Press has the story of an Army veteran who spent a decade working for the FBI by infiltrating KKK groups to identify law enforcement officers who were members.
- Buzzfeed investigates two agencies that have exploited content creators on OnlyFans, and now face lawsuits claiming extortionary practices, failure to pay creators, failure to pay overtime, and more. Workers’ rights are workers’ rights, regardless of the industry.
- A “terrible” book called Viral that pushes lab-leak conspiracy theories shows why people won’t let that idea go. Indeed, there’s new evidence further supporting the hypothesis that COVID-19 is a natural phenomenon.
- One thing, and only one thing, has worked to get unvaccinated people to get the jab: Employer mandates.
- In the “it’s about fucking time” department, California revoked the license of a doctor who gave out fake vaccine exemptions.
- Meanwhile, Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine have developed a vaccine, CORBEVAX, that they’re allowing countries around the world to use without patent restrictions. It’s just been approved for use in India, with more countries to follow. This might be the best weapon we have for slowing the pandemic.
- An Oklahoma lawmaker (guess the party!) wants to give parents the right to demand that a school remove any book from its library, and would reward such parents a bounty of $10,000 per day if the school doesn’t remove the book. It’s really about targeting LGBTQ+ books (and, by extension, LGBTQ+ kids), of course.
- One small thing anyone can do to help fight climate change: Eat less red meat.
- Georgia Republicans are trying to eliminate six of the seven polling stations in Lincoln County, a move activists see as targeting minority voters.
- “Christmas Wrapping” is unavoidable at this time of year; I’ve grown to hate the song thanks to a job in retail in the fall of 1989. Yahoo! has a look at the song’s complex history.
- The discourse, if you can even call it that, over critics’ disdain for Don’t Look Up is a symptom of society’s growing anti-intellectualism.
- Asmodee purchased Miniature Market, one of the biggest board game & miniatures retailers in the country, at some point in 2021, without any announcement.
- McSweeney’s offers An FAQ About Your New Birth Control: The Music of Rush. Is it bad that I know all of the songs mentioned? My wife says that’s bad.
The red meat article is linking to the Buzzfeed Onlyfans article.
My family has cut back on red meat quite a bit and try to purchase from small farmers. We’re probably not helping the environment out by eating lamb which may have worse impact than a cow. I like red meat (Shake Shack burgers and pho are a weakness) but I know it’s probably killing me.
Should be fixed, thank you.
We don’t eat beef, lamb, or any red meat except some pork products, and that’s pretty limited. We probably still eat too much meat in total, but at least we’re trending the right way.
An aside arising from reading the Malone article. Because of the (stupid) connotation that natural means healthier, I’ve started using “infection-induced immunity” instead of “natural immunity.” In contrast to vaccine-induced immunity. The actual immune response to virus or vaccine is perfectly natural for both.
What movie is “don’t look back”? Should it be “dont look up?”
ugh, yes
I see you’re still writing “2021” on your blog post subjects/titles, Klaw. ¡Felíz año nuevo!
The Rush birth control article cracked me up because every Rush fan I knew was male & when the Rush albums/songs/discussion started, all the females in the room went somewhere else.
This morning while making breakfast, I asked Alexa to play Rush because of this article. My wife audibly groaned where she heard Temples of Syrinx being played.
While I certainly understand the distinction drawn with Clemens’ off-field behavior, I don’t end up in the same place.
I assume McCready was telling the truth when she said the physical relationship did not begin until she was an adult. That moves Clemens’ acts from criminal to “just” skeevy. Then I compare that relationship with the allegations of spousal abuse including violence against others, including Bonds for whom KLaw checked off the box, and I can’t see a bright line to differentiate the off-field conduct sufficient to justify invoking the morals clause for one and not the others.
Five years working in record stores over Christmas (including 1989) and…yeah, Christmas Wrapping was one of the ones we dreaded. Not as bad as Wonderful Christmastime but still…
The one antidote was one of those Windham Hill “New Age” albums: We could put on George Winston’s December and, not only would the stress in the store drop by 5 degrees of…stress?…but we sold out of it every time we played it. If solo piano is your thing, I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Keith,
Are you allowed to reveal which 8 players you voted for? I realize the article and explanation require a subscription; I’m wondering if your actual ballot (without explanations) is public information?
Thanks, and Happy New Year
https://twitter.com/NotMrTibbs/status/1476603233065848853?t=oMybrUqWCjuUQNUgU1X-Ug&s=19
?
I’m not sure what that link is supposed to be linking to, but it didn’t link to a list of Keith’s picks; at least, not without a subscription to The Athletic, which I don’t have.
There is an image of his ballot.
ah yes, I found it now. Thanks! It looks like I can scroll through a bunch of writers’ ballots, but I won’t because I’ll probably get too agitated. The only one I accidentally glimpsed while clicking towards Keith’s ballot was a ballot that had Joe Nathan checked (??) but not David Ortiz (???????). Come on.
Regarding Keith’s ballot – Wow! No Clemens vote. Even with two unused slots !? (Keith – that’s merely an observation of surprise, given your previous statements about the steroid-suspected players; I’m not criticizing or attacking your vote because I know you explained it in detail in your article, which I haven’t read).
Other than that, I agree with the votes and non-votes except for Schilling. An obvious HOFer based on his playing career, far better than any other pitcher not yet in the HOF, and probably better than half the pitchers IN the HOF. I get that he’s a terrible person with terrible ideas and viewpoints, but still…..
Other players of note: Jeff Kent, despite his strong hitting stats, seems to garner little support. The advanced metrics don’t rate him very highly, though I never quite understood why. Also, he was apparently a bit of a pain in the ass as a teammate, but that shouldn’t really matter.
Billy Wagner is probably as good or better than half the relievers in the HOF, though I seem to recall that Keith said he’d be fine with Mariano Rivera being the only reliever in the HOF, and I think I kind of agree with that. I do think Billy Wagner has been generally underrated by the voters though relative to his already enshrined peers, and I’m not sure why.
Kent was a below-average fielder at any position of value. Also, his unadjusted stats probably look better to the naked eye before you factor in higher league-wide run scoring during his peak years.