Art Diamond – Page 68 – artdiamondblog.com

Unsound Trucking Firm “Blew Through” $700 Million of Federal Covid “Bailout” Loan

(p. A4) The Treasury Department erred in giving a loan to a troubled trucking company as part of a 2020 Covid-19 rescue package and should refrain from similar sector-specific loan programs in the future, according to a new congressional report.

Yellow, a trucking company, received a $700 million loan from the Treasury Department as part of an aid program for private industries included in bipartisan legislation known as the Cares Act enacted early in the pandemic.

But Treasury had to skirt the program’s rules to make the loan, the report said. The agency designated Yellow—then known as YRC Worldwide—as critical to national security even though the company didn’t meet the standard for that designation, the report said.

. . .

In exchange for the loan, Treasury received a roughly 30% stake in the company.

. . .

At the time of the loan the company was rated noninvestment grade by Moody’s Investors Service and was at risk of bankruptcy, according to the report.

. . .

In recent months, Yellow has again suffered from the broader freight slowdown.

. . .

Teamsters President Sean O’Brien said the union is abiding by the terms of its contract with the company.

“After decades of gross mismanagement, Yellow blew through a $700 million bailout from the federal government, and now it wants workers to foot the bill,” O’Brien said in a statement.

For the full story, see:

David Harrison. “Treasury Faulted for Loan to Troubled Trucking Firm.” The Wall Street Journal (Wednesday, June 28, 2023): A4.

(Note: ellipses added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated June 27, 2023, and has the title “Treasury Shouldn’t Have Given Pandemic Aid to Trucking Company, Report Finds.”)

As Worms Return to Arctic, Some Life Forms Will Thrive and Others Will Not

(p. A1) Worms are on the move, and people are nervous.

That’s because they’re taking over territory in the Far North that’s been wormless since the last ice age.

. . .

Because of changes in the chemistry and physics of the ground, grasses and shrubby plants tend to thrive, taking over from tundra mosses and lichens. That’s good news for the lemmings and voles that favor such plants, according to Hanna Jonsson, an ecology researcher at Umea University. But probably not good for other herbivores that might not adapt easily to a change in available food.

For the full story, see:

Sofia Quaglia. “Worms Haven’t Lived in the Arctic Since the Last Ice Age. But Now, They’re Back.” The New York Times (Saturday, July 15, 2023): A10.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date July 14, 2023, and has the title “Some Squirmy Stowaways Got to the Arctic. And They Like It There.”)

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Seeks to Bury Merging Firms in Paperwork

(p. A13) The Federal Trade Commission is trying to make it harder for companies to merge by burying them in paperwork. The FTC’s proposed overhaul of a critical part of the U.S. merger review process would increase the average time to prepare a merger filing from 37 hours to 144. According to the agency’s calculations, that’s roughly $350 million in added costs for an estimated 7,100 filings a year, which would be a boon for lawyers but a burden for businesses.

The one-size-fits-all proposal to add dozens of hours of paperwork per deal—regardless of competitive concerns—is an overreach by the FTC and the Justice Department’s antitrust division that will disproportionately chill investments at the lower end of the reporting threshold.

For the full commentary, see:

Christopher Williams and Henry Hauser. “Antitrust Officials Pile on the Paperwork.” The Wall Street Journal (Wednesday, July 5, 2023): A13.

(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date July 4, 2023, and has the same title as the print version.)

Portland Feels “Unsafe” and “There’s Trash Everywhere”

(p. A3) PORTLAND, Ore.—Mark Rogers has made a list of things he misses about Portland—its vegan restaurants, Powell’s bookstore, public transit—and the things he doesn’t—having his things stolen, stepping in human excrement, extreme politics.

The 44-year-old artist moved across the country to Fort Wayne, Ind., last year.

“I don’t want to talk trash about my home city even though there’s trash everywhere,” Rogers said.

. . .

Andrea Lamprecht, 50, a cardiac nurse, said she was chased by a homeless man while out on a jog in her Alameda neighborhood on the east side of Portland, where the median home price hovers around $1 million.

She and her husband, Derek Lamprecht, an orthopedic surgeon, had raised their children in Portland. The chasing incident contributed to the couple’s decision to move to a quiet rural area about 10 miles outside the city in 2021. “It never felt unsafe before,” said Derek Lamprecht. “The character of the city changed.”

For the full story, see:

Zusha Elinson. “Disenchanted Portland Residents Leave the City.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, June 29, 2023): A3.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date June 28, 2023, and has the title “Portland Is Losing Its Residents.”)

New 98% Reflective White Paint Can End Global Warming

(p. A1) In 2020, Dr. Ruan and his team unveiled their creation: a type of white paint that can act as a reflector, bouncing 95 percent of the sun’s rays away from the Earth’s surface, up through the atmosphere and into deep space. A few months later, they announced an even more potent formulation that increased sunlight reflection to 98 percent.

The paint’s properties are almost superheroic. It can make surfaces as much as eight degrees Fahrenheit cooler than ambient air temperatures at midday, and up to 19 degrees cooler at night, reducing temperatures inside build-(p. A12)ings and decreasing air-conditioning needs by as much as 40 percent. It is cool to the touch, even under a blazing sun, Dr. Ruan said. Unlike air-conditioners, the paint doesn’t need any energy to work, and it doesn’t warm the outside air.

. . .

. . ., scientists have been urgently working to develop reflective materials, including different types of coatings and films, that could passively cool the Earth. The materials rely on principles of physics that allow thermal energy to travel from Earth along specific wavelengths through what’s known as the transparency or sky window in the atmosphere, and out into deep space.

Jeremy Munday, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of California, Davis, who researches clean technology, said this redirection would barely affect space. The sun already emits more than a billion times more heat than the Earth, he said, and this method merely reflects heat already generated by the sun. “It’d be like pouring a cup of regular water into the ocean,” Dr. Munday said.

He calculated that if materials such as Purdue’s ultra-white paint were to coat between 1 percent and 2 percent of the Earth’s surface, slightly more than half the size of the Sahara, the planet would no longer absorb more heat than it was emitting, and global temperatures would stop rising.

. . .

While humans in such hot and picturesque places as Santorini and the aptly named Casablanca have long used white paint to cool dwellings, and municipalities are increasingly looking to paint rooftops white, Dr. Ruan said commercial white paints generally reflect 80 percent to 90 percent of sunlight. This means they still absorb 10 percent to 20 percent of the heat, which in turn warms surfaces and the ambient air. The Purdue paint, by comparison, absorbs so much less solar heat and radiates so much more heat into deep space that it cools surfaces to below-ambient temperatures.

For the full story, see:

Cara Buckley. “A Coat of Paint May Hold a Key To a Cool Planet.” The New York Times (Thursday, July 13, 2023): A1 & A12.

(Note: ellipses added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date July 12, 2023, and has the title “To Help Cool a Hot Planet, the Whitest of White Coats.”)

Langlois’s Entrepreneurs Allowed the Masses to Flourish in Spite of Chandler’s Corporatism

(p. D7)Students of business have long argued about why managerial capitalism arose and what led to its demise. At the heart of this debate is an age-old conundrum: What should the boundaries of a corporation be? What goods and services should it produce and which should it buy from others? Executives stake careers on such questions, but economists, historians and social critics have tried to answer them as well.

It is in such a context that Richard Langlois offers “The Corporation and the Twentieth Century,” a monumental history of American business during the eventful decades when managers ruled. Among much else, he makes the argument that firms embraced managerial capitalism in response to the century’s cataclysmic events and the heavy-handed government intercessions they prompted. When the crises and related policies finally fell away, we saw the resurgence of the focused, entrepreneurial enterprise that predominates today.

Mr. Langlois, an economics professor at the University of Connecticut, pushes back in particular against the explanation laid out by Alfred Chandler, the father of American business history, in his great work, “The Visible Hand” (1977).

. . .

Once established, managerial capitalism took on a life of its own. “The hierarchy itself,” Chandler wrote, “became a source of permanence, power, and continued growth.”

But Mr. Langlois tells a different story, contending that managerial capitalism didn’t truly flourish until later. He notes that, despite a wave of mergers, most large firms in the early 20th century were still controlled by their owners, thanks to the extensive shareholdings of financiers such as John D. Rockefeller or investment banks such as J.P. Morgan—owners not especially known as silent partners. The real heyday of the managers was yet to come.

Enter the reform-minded Progressive movement, which aimed to curtail the excesses of just such tycoons. Easily distinguished from today’s progressives by their capital letter and lack of stated pronouns, the Progressives held that scientific techniques had solved the problems of industrial management and would do likewise for those of government administration, which was to be entrusted to “experts.”

These Progressives brought with them a hubristic “managerial model of the world” that called forth a managerial form of capitalism, one designed to clasp the meddlesome hand of government. The ensuing era of federal regulation offered big business relief from haphazard and potentially more radical state regulation, but it also shifted power over firms toward Washington and the federal judiciary.

The ground was thus laid for managerial capitalism to be turbocharged by “the great catastrophes” of World War I, the Depression and World War II.

. . .

(p. D8) Mr. Langlois recognizes that the deregulating spirit of the 1970s was part of a change in the Zeitgeist. He describes, for example, how the Bay Area’s hippie ethos intersected with the rise of the personal computer. The resulting digital revolution upended corporate hierarchies and changed much of America’s output from the physical to the intangible. Ascendant tech firms ushered in a new entrepreneurial paradigm. The center of business gravity shifted from Manhattan boardrooms and Midwestern factories to the freewheeling West Coast.

Vietnam and inflation, meanwhile, sapped faith in government as well as in the dollar, and a series of countries (lately China) would soon replace the U.S. as the world’s factory. The unbundling of corporations was accelerated by low-cost overseas manufacturing and by the new “barbarians at the gate” from Wall Street.

. . .

The questions at the heart of “The Corporation and the Twentieth Century” . . . serve as the engine of a remarkable alternative history of what Henry Luce famously called the American Century. It’s a work propelled by vast learning, a focus on business and a consistent point of view in favor of free markets.

For the full review see:

Daniel Akst. “BOOKSHELF; The Rise and Fall of Managers.” The Wall Street Journal (Saturday, July 1, 2023): C7-C8.

(Note: ellipses added.)

(Note: the online version of the review has the date June 30, 2023, and has the title “BOOKSHELF; ‘The Corporation and the Twentieth Century’ Review: The Rise and Fall of Managers.”)

The book under review is:

Langlois, Richard N. The Corporation and the Twentieth Century: The History of American Business Enterprise. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2023.

60-Year-Old Retired Musician Says She Will “Fetch a Gun” to Defend Taiwan’s Freedom

(p. A1) TAIPEI, Taiwan—People in Taiwan have been following every twist of the war in Ukraine. But, while their sympathy for the Ukrainian cause is near-universal, the conclusions for the island’s own future widely diverge.

To some, the takeaway is that even a seemingly invincible foe can be defeated if a society stands firm, an inspiration for Taiwan’s own effort to resist a feared invasion by China. Others draw the opposite lesson from the images of smoldering Ukrainian cities. Anything is better than war, they say, and Taiwan should do all it can to avoid provoking Beijing’s wrath, even if that means painful compromises.

. . .

(p. A8) “The young people are the ones who don’t want unification with China,” said ret. Lt. Gen. Chang Yan-ting, a former deputy commander of Taiwan’s air force. “But if you want independence, you need to fight, and they also don’t want to fight. Therein is the conflict.”

Yi-hao, a student in Taiwan’s National Defense University, was an exception. “Before the war in Ukraine, we were taught that Russia’s military power is stronger than China’s, and Taiwan’s military was stronger than Ukraine’s,” he said. “If they were able to resist this long, Taiwan will definitely be able to hold out.” He didn’t want his surname used because he wasn’t authorized by the military to speak.

Lai Yi-chi, who became a lieutenant after graduating from the Naval Academy in June [2023], said that she had been inspired by the bravery and resilience of Ukrainian soldiers, something often discussed in her classes. “We should also embody such spirit and determination,” she said.

Bypassing the official armed forces, some volunteer groups have decided to act on their own, preparing fellow citizens for a possible war. One such group is Kuma Academy, which received a $100 million donation from Robert Tsao, the founder of the United Microelectronics, one of the world’s biggest semiconductor companies.

“We don’t intend to build up a private army,” Tsao said. “But I think their effort will probably increase the resilience of Taiwan’s society. If we know how to hide, how to help each other, how to retain communication, we can pretty much reduce the damage in wartime.” Some of the students also like to learn more martial skills, such as shooting, Tsao said, but Taiwan’s strict gun laws make it difficult. Some 25,000 Taiwanese have been trained at Kuma.

Nico Li, a 60-year-old retired musician attending a Kuma class, said she was unnerved by growing risks coming from China, and wanted to arm herself to avoid being a burden to her children. “Taiwan is an island of treasure. I don’t want to hand it over to others without a fight,” Li said, referring to what she sees as the Taiwanese values of freedom and democracy. “If I have the ability, I would even go and fetch a gun if necessary.”

At another training session, run by the Forward Alliance, dozens of Taiwanese practiced how to stop arterial bleeding with tourniquets and stabilize major wounds. “There is a sense of impending doom, of feeling very hopeless,” said one of the students, Eric Lin. “So, instead of sitting at home and browsing the negative news, I wanted to come here—so that I would be able to do something.”

For the full story, see:

Yaroslav Trofimov and Joyu Wang. “Taiwan’s Impossible Choice: Be Ukraine or Hong Kong.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, July 6, 2023): A1 & A8.

(Note: ellipsis, and bracketed year, added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date July 5, 2023, and has the same title as the print version.)

Seaweed Blob Disappears as Unpredictably as It First Appeared

(p. 19) For months, Florida’s usually picturesque coast was plagued by a rotting tangle of seaweed, known as sargassum. Then, as quickly as the stinking mass arrived, it began to disappear.

. . .

Last month, the amount of sargassum in the Gulf of Mexico dropped by a staggering 75 percent, Dr. Hu and colleagues at the University of South Florida Optical Oceanography Lab noted in a bulletin published [June 30, 2023].

. . .

But scientists don’t know why the decline was so rapid. One theory is that strong winds caused by recent tropical storms could have dissipated the sargassum into smaller clumps, or sunk it to the ocean floor, Dr. Hu said, making it hard to see from a satellite. “There could be other reasons, we just don’t know,” he added.

For the full story, see:

Livia Albeck-Ripka. “The Blob That Threatened Florida . . . Is Disappearing.” The New York Times, First Section (Sunday, July 9, 2023): 19.

(note: ellipses in story added; ellipsis in title in original.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date July 7, 2023, and has the title “Good News, Florida. The Giant Seaweed Blob Has Shrunk.” The bracketed date was in the print, but not the online, version.)

Elderly Benefit Most from Air-Conditioning

(p. A18) The aging process makes older bodies generally less capable of withstanding extreme heat, doctors say.

“They’re at extremely high risk of heat stroke and death,” James H. Diaz, a professor of environmental and occupational health sciences at Louisiana State University’s School of Public Health, said of older people. “When we look at what happens with these heat waves, most of the deaths occur in the homebound elderly.”

In many communities, including in New Orleans and Houston, officials have opened cooling centers and shelters in recent weeks, with air-conditioned shuttle buses meandering through neighborhoods, picking people up. Programs are also in place to provide or repair air-conditioners or help people struggling to afford their electricity bills.

. . .

In . . . Orlando, Veronica King, 67, said she keeps her air-conditioner running even if she can’t afford to. “I have to figure out how to cover that bill,” she said, adding that she relies on machines that help her breathe. “When it’s hot, I can’t breathe.”

In Houston, where the heat index could reach 107 degrees on Sunday, Ms. Lowry and her husband, Jasper, 72, have come up with a compromise. They have two cars, neither with working air-conditioning. But they figured they could at least spare the money to repair it in one of them.

For the full story, see:

Shannon Sims and Rick Rojas. “Rising Temperatures Could Bring More Than Misery for Seniors.” The New York Times, First Section (Sunday, July 9, 2023): 18.

(note: ellipses added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated July 12, 2023, and has the title “Rising Temperatures Threaten More Than Misery for Oldest Americans.”)

Dem Celebrities and Politicians Cultivated Crony Ties to FTX Fraudster Bankman-Fried

(p. B1) About 10 months before he was arrested on fraud charges, the cryptocurrency mogul Sam Bankman-Fried posed for a photograph at the 2022 Super Bowl in Inglewood, Calif.

On one side of him were Orlando Bloom and Katy Perry, the celebrity couple. On the other was the actress Kate Hudson. Standing in the center, with his arm slung over Mr. Bankman-Fried’s shoulder, was a lesser-known figure: Michael Kives.

Mr. Kives, a Hollywood agent turned investor, played an unusual role in Mr. Bankman-Fried’s business empire: super connector. He and his business partner, Bryan Baum, helped the young founder cultivate relationships with Mr. Bloom, Ms. Perry and former President Bill Clinton, and offered introductions to a who’s who of celebrities and business leaders, from Leonardo DiCaprio to the governor of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund.

The relationship was mutually beneficial. Mr. Bankman-Fried invested $700 million in Mr. Kives’s venture-capital firm, court records show, an extraordinary level of support for a fund with a short track record of start-up investments. Mr. Kives, the founder and face of the firm, and Mr. Baum each received $125 million as part of the deal.

For the full story, see:

David Yaffe-Bellany and Erin Griffith. “The Celebrity Super Connector Who Brought Big Names to FTX.” The New York Times (Saturday, June 24, 2023): B1 & B4.

(Note: the online version of the story has the date June 23, 2023, and has the title “The Super Connector Who Built Sam Bankman-Fried’s Celebrity World.”)

Feds Release Covid Origin Report on a Friday Evening–A Time to “Put Out News They Want Buried or Ignored”

(p. A12) The Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a long-awaited declassified report, which included spy agencies’ findings on the so-called lab leak theory, . . .

The 10-page report said scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology did conduct research on coronaviruses, in some cases had inadequate safety measures and had genetically engineered coronaviruses.

. . .

After three years of study, some senior U.S. officials have said that the spy agencies are unlikely to come to any satisfactory conclusion, in large measure because China has not cooperated with international inquiries and some officials in Beijing are not interested in digging deeper into the cause of the pandemic.

. . .

The report was released on a Friday evening, traditionally a time when administrations put out news they want buried or ignored. Conservatives had criticized the government for failing to meet a deadline of the beginning of the week, though few congressionally mandated reports are delivered precisely on time.

While Biden administration officials have said they have ordered investigations without favoring one theory over another, Republicans have harshly criticized how the White House and its intelligence agencies have investigated Covid’s origins.

“The lab leak is the only theory supported by science, intelligence and common sense,” John Ratcliffe, who served as the director of national intelligence in the Trump administration, said as the report was released Friday [June 23, 2023], adding: “The Biden administration’s continued obfuscation of Covid origins is a disservice to the intelligence community.”

For the full story, see:

Julian E. Barnes. “Intelligence Agencies Remain Divided Over Theory That Covid Came From Lab.” The New York Times (Saturday, June 24, 2023): A11.

(Note: ellipses, and bracketed date, added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date June 23, 2023, and has the title “U.S. Intelligence Report Finds No Clear Evidence of Covid Origins in Wuhan Lab.”)