{"id":10268,"date":"2024-05-04T22:04:37","date_gmt":"2024-05-05T02:04:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/?p=10268"},"modified":"2024-05-04T22:04:38","modified_gmt":"2024-05-05T02:04:38","slug":"stick-to-baseball-5-4-24","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/2024\/05\/04\/stick-to-baseball-5-4-24\/","title":{"rendered":"Stick to baseball, 5\/4\/24."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Two new pieces for subscribers to the Athletic this week, <a href=\"https:\/\/theathletic.com\/5470916\/2024\/05\/04\/marlins-padres-trade-analysis-luis-arraez-dillon-head\/\">a breakdown of the Luis Arraez trade<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/theathletic.com\/5459493\/2024\/04\/30\/minor-league-scouting-justin-crawford\/\">scouting notes on Justin Crawford and other Phillies, Orioles, and Mets prospects<\/a>. I\u2019ve also got a draft scouting notebook going up on Sunday with notes on J.J. Wetherholt, Hagen Smith, Peyton Stovall, and Ryan Waldschmidt. And I held a <a href=\"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/2024\/05\/02\/klawhat-5-2-24\/\">Klawchat<\/a> on Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I sent out a new edition of <a href=\"https:\/\/keithlaw.substack.com\/\">my free email newsletter<\/a> last Saturday, so I should do another one in a day or two, in theory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019ll be back on Stadium on Monday at 2 pm ET for <em>Diamond Dreams <\/em>and then for one segment of <em>Unpacked<\/em> at 2:30 pm. The shows re-air throughout the week, roughly twice a day, as far as I can tell. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.watchstadium.com\/where-to-watch\">You can watch via the app<\/a> or with certain subscriptions to Youtube, Fubo, Roku, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And now, the links\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Longreads first: The <em>Columbia Spectator<\/em>, with the help of <em>New York<\/em> magazine, has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.columbiaspectator.com\/news\/2024\/05\/04\/our-campus-our-crisis\/\">a detailed look at the protests, the encampments, the police overreach, and more on campus<\/a>, through hundreds of interviews with students and faculty across the religious and ideological divides.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>In the <em>Atlantic, <\/em>Tyler Austin Harper writes of how colleges positioned themselves as activist havens when speaking to prospective students, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/ideas\/archive\/2024\/05\/college-activism-hypocrisy\/678262\/\">only to find that those students believed them<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>LA Times<\/em> has the story of a man who engineered <a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/california\/story\/2024-04-28\/san-joaquin-valley-official-accused-of-epic-california-water-heist?CARDCRITICS-2024_05_02=&amp;category=fascinating_stories&amp;position=2&amp;scheduled_corpus_item_id=ba4c5064-f640-437b-a67b-157a94f18e0a&amp;sponsored=0&amp;url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fcalifornia%2Fstory%2F2024-04-28%2Fsan-joaquin-valley-official-accused-of-epic-california-water-heist&amp;utm_source=pocket_saves\">the theft of millions of gallons of water from California\u2019s limited resources<\/a>, while enriching himself and his friends and lying on his income taxes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>ProPublica reports on the EPA\u2019s decision to ignore its own scientists and approve a plastic fuel additive <a href=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/epa-approved-chevron-fuel-ingredient-cancer-risk-plastics-biofuel\">that is nearly guaranteed to cause cancer in anyone exposed to it regularly over a lifetime<\/a>. Well, a shortened lifetime, I guess.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>Washington Post<\/em> ran a long piece on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/climate-environment\/interactive\/2024\/flooding-sea-level-rise-gulf-coast\/?carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3d8ce66%2F662fcaf27f4e8a2cca38251c%2F597310259bbc0f1cdcf10170%2F11%2F51%2F662fcaf27f4e8a2cca38251c\">the effects of sea level rise on the coastal U.S.<\/a>, much of it in states whose elected officials have denied climate change and fought efforts to mitigate it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A research study by the Australian government\u2019s Institute of Criminology examined <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aic.gov.au\/sites\/default\/files\/2024-05\/ti693_grievances_and_conspiracy_theories_as_motivators.pdf\">how anti-COVID protests brought together numerous anti-government forces<\/a>, including those beholden to conspiracy theories and extremist anti-authority sentiments (like so-called \u201csovereign citizens\u201d).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Amos Goldberg, a Holocaust and genocide researcher at Hebrew University, writes about the assault on Gaza: \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/thepalestineproject.medium.com\/yes-it-is-genocide-634a07ea27d4\">Yes, it is genocide<\/a>.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Sam Thorpe, a Jewish economist who works as a Senior Research Assistant for the Brookings Institute\u2019s Tax Policy Center, wrote in a series of tweets that <a href=\"https:\/\/threadreaderapp.com\/thread\/1785755189053362208.html\">it is possible to be Jewish and oppose the actions of Israel in Gaza<\/a>. He argues that it is imperative for believers to do so, as his faith teaches that all humans are made in the image of God.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Meanwhile, Israel\u2019s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich <a href=\"https:\/\/www.haaretz.com\/israel-news\/2024-04-30\/ty-article\/.premium\/smotrich-calls-for-no-half-measures-in-the-total-annihilation-of-gaza\/0000018f-2f4c-d9c3-abcf-7f7d25460000?utm_source=pocket_saves\">called for the \u201ctotal annihilation\u201d of Gaza<\/a>, after which <em>Haaretz<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.haaretz.com\/opinion\/editorial\/2024-04-30\/ty-article-opinion\/smotrich-must-pay-the-price-for-his-repeated-calls-for-genocide-of-palestinians\/0000018f-3084-d0b5-a59f-31c5ca320000\">called for his firing<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Of course, the American media are more caught up in covering campus protests, and not even getting the angle right, such as <a href=\"https:\/\/indianapublicmedia.org\/news\/isp-leader-on-iu-protests-we-may-be-back-at-a-time-known-only-to-us.php\">the Indiana State Police\u2019s excessive use of force<\/a> \u2013 including setting up a sniper on a nearby building! \u2013 against protesters at IU. This link has an interview with ISP Superintendent Doug Carter, who doesn\u2019t seem to have the foggiest idea of what freedom of speech means.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>LA Times<\/em>\u2019 Michael Hiltzik wrote <a href=\"https:\/\/www.latimes.com\/business\/story\/2024-04-29\/column-calling-the-police-on-campus-protests-show-that-college-presidents-havent-learned-a-thing-since-the-1960s\">that college presidents who rush to call in the police haven\u2019t learned a damn thing since the 1960s<\/a>. Today is the anniversary of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2024\/05\/04\/1249023924\/kent-state-shooting-activists-protests-survivor\">the police murdering four students at Kent State<\/a> who were protesting U.S. involvement in Vietnam, by the way.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Credit goes to the Philadelphia police, however, who declined Penn\u2019s request that they come clear out student protesters <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thedp.com\/article\/2024\/05\/philadelphia-police-declines-disband-encampment-after-penn-requests-help\">unless the school could provide evidence of imminent danger<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>CNN\u2019s Dana Bash went on air and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discourseblog.com\/p\/cnns-disgraceful-propaganda\">parroted a bunch of pro-Israel talking points while comparing pro-Palestinian protesters to Nazi forces<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Ken Klippenstein resigned from The Intercept and revealed some of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kenklippenstein.com\/p\/why-im-resigning-from-the-intercept\">how management there sought to spike stories critical of Jeff Bezos and other rich, powerful targets<\/a>, all while apparently paying themselves more while laying off editors and journalists. I\u2019ve linked to quite a bit of Ken\u2019s work here and will probably sign up for his newsletter now that he\u2019s going solo.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Andrew Huberman\u2019s podcast is one of the most popular in America. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/technology\/24127540\/huberman-lab-science-misleading-information-andrew-huberman-podcasts-joe-rogan-health-medicine\">It\u2019s also rife with false information<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Florida has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2024\/apr\/29\/florida-childrens-health-insurance-program-ron-desantis\">removed over 22,000 children from its version of the Children\u2019s Health Insurance Program<\/a> (CHIP) this year, defying a federal law designed to protect them. I never though the wolves would eat my face!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Meanwhile, Florida\u2019s farmers are suffering from a lack of labor <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2024\/04\/26\/1242236604\/florida-economy-immigration-businesses-workers-undocumented\">thanks to the state\u2019s draconian law attacking businesses that used undocumented workers<\/a>, as are construction businesses, restaurants, and hoteliers, all major industries in the state.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA) shared a video of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/news\/ole-miss-racist-video\">white University of Mississippi students making monkey noises and shouting racist chants at a Black protester<\/a>, saying \u201cOle Miss taking care of business\u201d (while using the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2020\/07\/27\/us\/ole-miss-university-mississippi-name-controversy\/index.html\">racist-derived nickname<\/a> for the school). Collins has previously shared posts from neo-Nazis and suggested murdering migrants, so we shouldn\u2019t be surprised.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/chicago.suntimes.com\/2024\/05\/02\/chicago-police-no-discipline-officers-extremist-group\">Chicago won\u2019t discipline nine city police officers who were (are?) members of the right-wing extremist Oath Keepers group<\/a>, after the mayor and CPD superintendent had promised to do so.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled that <a href=\"https:\/\/transgenderlegal.org\/stay-informed\/fourth-circuit-rules-nc-and-wv-cant-deny-trans-people-coverage-for-medical-care\/\">North Carolina and West Virginia can\u2019t deny gender-affirming medical coverage to transgender people<\/a>. North Carolina sought to specifically deny it to state employees and their dependents, while West Virginia sought to do so for people enrolled in Medicaid.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Arizona&#8217;s Kari Lake, running as a Republican for the seat that Krysten Sinema is vacating, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.phoenixnewtimes.com\/news\/kari-lake-endorsement-sonny-borrelli-18861877\">is touting State Sen. Sonny Borrelli\u2019s endorsement of her<\/a>, even though Borrelli \u2013 the Arizona Senate Majority Leader has a history of domestic violence allegations against him and said just this March that women should put an aspirin between their knees as a method of birth control.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>A second Boeing whistleblower has died. Joshua Dean, who was 45, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2024\/05\/02\/1248693512\/boeing-whistleblower-josh-dean-dead\">died of a MRSA infection this week<\/a>; John Barnett, 62, died in March in an apparent suicide, although friends and family have raised doubts that he took his own life.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <em>Guardian<\/em> looks <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/music\/2024\/apr\/25\/shocking-truth-money-bands-make-on-tour-taylor-swift\">at how many bands make little to no money, even taking losses, from touring<\/a>. With record sales in the toilet and tours unprofitable, what career is there in making music if you\u2019re not a superstar?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>I thought Netflix\u2019s <em>Baby Reindeer<\/em> was outstanding, and am pulling for the two stars to earn Emmy nominations for their work, especially Jessica Gunning (who plays Martha). NPR\u2019s Glenn Weldon argued that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2024\/04\/25\/1247130712\/baby-reindeer-review-netflix\">the series bungled its depiction of queerness<\/a>; I didn\u2019t interpret it this way, but I\u2019m also straight and perhaps not the right person to answer this question.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Two new studies on the economics of sports and sport stadium financing: One that showed that <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/10.1177\/10911421241232444\">policing becomes more aggressive<\/a> where there are public subsidies of sports facilities, apparently to help make up for budget shortfalls; the other showed that sporting events lead to an increase in crime, and <a href=\"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/10.1177\/15270025221107145\">thus to an increase in spending on policing<\/a>, two ways in which public subsidies for sports stadiums negatively impact the local economy.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>ProPublica reports on a new effort at the IRS to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.propublica.org\/article\/sports-team-owners-face-new-scrutiny-from-irs-over-tax-avoidance\">identify illegal tax avoidance schemes by sports-team owners<\/a>. It would appear these owners are happy to take taxpayer money, but not to pay back in the legally required portion of their profits.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Paris claimed it was going to use the Olympics as a spur to revitalize one of its poorest districts, Seine-Saint-Denis; instead it appears they\u2019ve <a href=\"https:\/\/theworld.org\/stories\/2024\/04\/25\/this-paris-suburb-gets-a-facelift-amid-controversy-ahead-of-the-2024-olympic-games\">evicted impoverished residents and decreased the region\u2019s air quality<\/a>. The district was the site of the 2005 riots against the police that inspired the Oscar-nominated 2019 film <em>Les Mis\u00e9rables<\/em>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Antiabortion zealots are trying to force the Amarillo, Texas, city council to pass a ridiculous, unenforceable ordinance <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2024\/04\/30\/amarillo-texas-abortion-travel-ban-ordinance\/\">forbidding the use of city streets for the purpose of leaving the state for an abortion<\/a>. Find someone who loves you as much as these people love depriving other people of their rights.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Utah passed a transphobic bathroom law, and in the first week in which the site to report alleged violations was live, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.salon.com\/2024\/05\/04\/utah-fields-nearly-4000-bogus-reports-in-first-week-of-trans-bathroom-ban\/\">they received almost 4000 bogus reports and left a bunch of information unprotected for anyone to access<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two new pieces for subscribers to the Athletic this week, a breakdown of the Luis Arraez trade and scouting notes on Justin Crawford and other Phillies, Orioles, and Mets prospects. I\u2019ve also got a draft scouting notebook going up on Sunday with notes on J.J. Wetherholt, Hagen Smith, Peyton Stovall, and Ryan Waldschmidt. And I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1300,566,77,828,1391,113,128,1387,190,961,1268,1059,852,895,1393,1197,870,295,477,1239,483,987],"class_list":["post-10268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-abortion","tag-arizona","tag-chicago","tag-climate-change","tag-colleges","tag-environment","tag-florida","tag-gaza","tag-links","tag-longreads","tag-misinformation","tag-mississippi","tag-music","tag-olympics","tag-paris","tag-police","tag-stick-to-baseball","tag-taxes","tag-texas","tag-trans-rights","tag-utah","tag-water-crisis","entry"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10268"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10269,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10268\/revisions\/10269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}