It seems like so much of the news I've read today concerns people behaving stupidly, but thinking they're behaving intelligently. Sadly, it's mostly the same group of people:
Finally, people in Bridgeport and other Southwest Side neighborhoods have fallen in love with a rotund beaver who lives with her family on the Chicago River. Some have suggested naming the beaver Lori Heavyfoot or Dam Ryan. I hope she doesn't meet up with one of the city's other charismatic megafauna...
Paul Krugman wonders aloud why people in Upstate New York—who will probably never in their lives drive to SoHo—care so much about the lower-Manhattan congestion pricing zone:
Morning Consult found that while residents of New York City approve of the congestion charge, residents of New York State as a whole disapprove by a substantial margin. What this tells us is that negative views of the charge come from upstaters, people who will almost never pay it or experience its effects.
Which brings me to the most important enemy of this remarkably successful policy, someone who definitely isn’t personally affected: Donald Trump, who told the New York Post that he wants to “kill” congestion pricing (and bike lanes too.)
The first question is, why should Trump be weighing in on this issue at all, let alone trying to force the city to change policy? Aren’t conservatives supposed to believe in local control?
I do wonder whether general hostility to New York is part of the story. Many people, and Trump in particular, are committed to the view that one of the safest places in America is an urban hellscape. A policy that improves life in the city runs counter to that narrative and inspires visceral opposition. And Trump in particular surely wants to hurt a city that has never supported him.
But maybe the biggest reason for Trump’s desire to kill the congestion charge is a phenomenon I identified the last time I wrote about this: the rage some Americans obviously feel at any suggestion that people should change their behavior for the common good.
This is literally why we can't have nice things. Why, as anyone who has traveled to Europe or East Asia can tell you, we have fallen so far behind our peers.
Since I live in a dense urban environment and drive a plug-in hybrid, I can go a long time without buying gasoline.
Last night, I broke down and put 35 liters of gas in the car, because I'm concerned the OAFPOTUS's tariffs against Canada will cause petrol prices to spike in the Midwest. In fairness, I only had 3 liters left, but still: I could have gone another month!
I last filled up coming back from watching the eclipse on April 8th. So I did set a new personal record for time between refueling: 300 days. Sadly, the 2,863 km between fuel stops didn't get all the way to my PR of 3,116 km or the Holy Grail of 3,219 km (2,000 miles). And hey, 1.2 L/100 km (194.3 MPG) really doesn't suck. Since buying the car six years ago, I've spent less than $600 on gas. That also doesn't suck.
Still, I'm annoyed that politics interfered. The OAFPOTUS continues to present as the dumbest person ever to sit in the Oval Office by at least 20 IQ points.
First: the good. My friend Kat Kruse has a new book of her short stories coming out. She let me read a couple of them, and I couldn't wait to pre-order the entire collection. I should get it on February 17th.
Still on the good things—or at least the things that don't seem so bad, considering:
Now for the bad:
And, of course, the stupid:
I might as well finish with a good thing. The temperature has gotten all the way up to 6.2°C at Inner Drive Technology WHQ and 7.8°C at O'Hare. It was last this warm at WHQ on December 29th. If O'Hare can get up to 11.1°C, it will eke past December 27th.
Just four, plus a bonus:
Finally, in a column from just before the world ended, author Adam-Troy Castro explains, "Why do liberals think all Trump supporters are stupid?":
The serious answer: Here’s what we really think about Trump supporters — the rich, the poor, the malignant and the innocently well-meaning, the ones who think and the ones who don’t ...
That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.”
That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, “Okay.”
...
What you don’t get, Trump supporters in 2019, is that succumbing to frustration and thinking of you as stupid may be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also...hear me...charitable.
Because if you’re NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are less flattering.
Exactly.
So much to read...tomorrow morning, when I wake up:
Finally, Block Club Chicago wonders why coyotes seem to be everywhere right now? I have two explanations: first, because it's mating season; and second, because of confirmation bias. We had two coyote sightings in strange places last week, and people are seeing more coyotes in general because they want to get laid. So that leads to more articles on coyotes. QED.
Today marks the middle of winter, when fewer days remain in the (meteorological) season than have passed. Good thing, too: yesterday we had temperatures that looked happy on a graph but felt miserable in real life, and the forecast for Sunday night into Monday will be even worse—as in, a low of -20°C going "up" to -14°C. Fun!.
(Yesterday's graph:)

Elsewhere in the world:
- Israel and Hamas have reached a cease-fire agreement, with the US and Qatar signing off.
- OAFPOTUS Defense Secretary nominee, former Fox News pretty boy, and all-around fundamentalist crackpot Pete Hegseth sat before the US Senate Armed Services committee yesterday, whose Republican members asked him about "your wife that you love" and whose Democratic members asked him about unlawful orders and the numerous allegations of wrongdoing against him. My combat-decorated junior Senator, Tammy Duckworth (D), flatly called him "unqualified." (She was being polite.)
- Jennifer Rubin calls Hegseth "the greatest DEI disaster ever:" "Considering Hegseth, election denier Attorney General Pam Bondi, WWE exec Linda McMahon for secretary of education, and vaccine denier, brain-worm victim Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for Health and Human Services, one must conclude Republicans are not sending us their best. (Or, the more alarming alternative…they are sending their best.)" Ruth Marcus also piled on.
- Author John Scalzi shares his thoughts on the allegations against and admissions of author Neil Gaiman published in New York this week.
- Chicago's Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) has proposed $1.5 bn in spending to improve transit for the entire area.
- Chicago lost another coyote yesterday when a plane taking off from O'Hare ran him over. (Neither the FAA nor United Airlines has confirmed that the coyote died, but I think we can make an inference here.)
- Last year was the second-warmest on record in Illinois, continuing a long-term warming trend that began after the coldest winters ever in the early 1980s.
Finally, as of today I've had a private pilot certificate for 25 years. When I last posted about this anniversary, I hoped to resume flying later that spring. Alas, something else was in the air. I still want to fly again, though. All I need is a winning lottery ticket.
Yesterday, the temperature at Inner Drive Technology World HQ scraped along at -11°C early in the morning before "warming" up to -7.5°C around 3pm. Cassie and I got a 22-minute walk around then and she seemed fine. Today the pattern completely inverted. I woke up during the warmest part of the day: 7am, -8°C. Around 8am the temperature started dropping and now hovers around -11°C again—slightly colder than the point where I limit Cassie to 15 minutes outside. She just doesn't feel cold, apparently, and would happily stay outside until she passed out from hypothermia.
So, bottom line, I'm in no hurry to take her for her lunchtime walk.
Besides, I've got a lot of interesting stories to read:
- Former Canadian Liberal Party leader Michael Ignatieff explains why he's a liberal, and why you should be, too.
- Jesse Wegman and Lee Drutman have some ideas about how to fix the United States' "two-party problem:" proportional representation.
- Block Club Chicago lists 10 of its investigations into the Chicago Transit Authority's mismanagement under its outgoing boss, Dorval Carter.
- Chuck Marohn explains why building tons of new housing in old, dense cities like San Francisco and NYC doesn't work as well as people hope.
- Two Illinois state representatives introduced a bill in the state House to decriminalize sex work, which would dramatically increase their safety and security.
- British computer scientist Peter Kirstein died five years ago, and left behind a delightful essay on the beginnings of the Internet—and the Internet's first-ever password.
- James Poniewozik has a fun history of TV show opening titles that will waste a few minutes of your afternoon (in a good way).
Finally, yet another coyote found his way into a store, this time an Aldi in Humboldt Park. Almost 17 years ago one of his ancestors tried to hide in a Quiznos sandwich shop in the Loop. The result was the same for both: removal and relocation. Block Club says yesterday's incident involved "rescuing" the coyote from the Aldi, but that seems pretty harsh. Like, was the coyote trying to go to Whole Foods instead? They're usually not that bougie.
A friend pointed out that, as of this morning, we've passed the darkest 36-day period of the year: December 3rd to January 8th. On December 3rd at Inner Drive Technology World HQ, the sun rose at 7:02 and set at 16:20, with 9 hours 18 minutes of daylight. Today it rose at 7:18 and will set at 16:38, for 9 hours 20 minutes of daylight. By the end of January we'll have 10 hours of daylight and the sun will set after 5pm for the first time since November 3rd.
It helps that we've had nothing but sun today. And for now, at least, we can forget about the special weather statement that just came out warning of snow and winds starting later tonight.
Meanwhile, in the rest of the world:
Finally, National Geographic explains how the two cups of tea I drink every day (three in the summer) will help me live to 107 years old.
The Times morning newsletter highlighted a story from Tuesday about yet one more example of people who have come to believe something that is not only crashingly stupid, but potentially fatal:
[A] small number of spring water aficionados...believe untreated water, or “raw water,” contains enriching minerals that are removed from tap water during the purification process.
The trend, however, alarms health experts, who say that spring water devotees are taking unnecessary risks. The country’s robust water treatment system, they emphasize, eliminates potentially deadly bacteria and parasites, and removes toxins that can cause cancer or harm children’s brain development.
Nonetheless, untreated water enthusiasts across the nation study crowdsourced spring maps and leave online comments as if they are reviewing the latest restaurants. At Red Rock Spring near Stinson Beach, Calif., the wait can be as long as 40 minutes, but the patrons are said to be friendly and the views spectacular, according to Google reviews.
Randy Dahlgren, a professor at the University of California, Davis, who studies watersheds, said that compared with other natural water sources, springs tended to be safer to drink from since they originated deep in the ground and the water was naturally filtered through layers of soil that could remove microbial pathogens. Fresh spring water can contain calcium, magnesium and other beneficial nutrients, and may not contain microplastics or “forever chemicals” as some tap water does, he said.
ut raw water can also be tainted with pesticides from nearby farms, contain arsenic that naturally occurs in soil, and harbor bacteria such as E. coli and salmonella that can make people extremely sick. In 2022, 19 people in Montana became ill, including one who was hospitalized, after drinking from what they thought was a spring but was actually creek drainage.
The reporter spent some time at Red Rock Spring. Basically, water dribbles out of a pair of copper pipes jammed into a cliff face by the road. No one can say with any certainty (a) where the water comes from, (b) what it contains, or (c) who put the pipes there. And yet these modern-day hippies happily fill carboys with the water and feed it to their children.
Carl Sagan was right: if society neglects teaching people critical-thinking skills, society gets dumber.