State of the Discussion

I'm sitting here laughing at myself, looking at my novella-length posts in this thread.
I've just started a short course of prednisone to deal with an inflammatory reaction I'm having to COVID, which I had back in June.
My wife and I were visiting with friends yesterday and they asked about it all. Was it making me aggressive?
No, my wife said. But it's making him talk a lot.
:: rimshot ::
I will try to be more concise, going forward.

Thanks for sharing all of that, wj.
The immediate situation in my area is this: in 2021 MA passed a law requiring that towns with public transportation access, or towns adjacent to them, had to allow multi-family zoning in areas near the public transportation.
A number of communities affected by the law refused to comply. Most or all of these are upper-middle-class bedroom communities. Failure to comply is likely to result in the loss of significant state money, and the state may also appoint a special manager to write a compliance plan for you.
I live in one of those towns, and the issue has been front and center. Folks who object to the law give lots of reasons for their objection, but basically they DO NOT WANT multi-family housing. Or, more multi-family housing, we already have some.
They have a point. The town is already pretty densely populated, more people will require more services, etc etc etc.
But the town also has a lot of very, very wealthy people in it, and many more who are aspirationally very, very wealthy. Those folks don't want development that is going to make the town look down-market, because it will undermine the market value of their property. And those property values are, indeed, high - insanely high, because there is a lot of money chasing housing in this area.
So a lot of folks who work in the town - tradespeople, cops, nurses, teachers, mechanics - live somewhere else. A lot of people who work in the town *and grew up in the town* live somewhere else.
It's a really old town, and there are some old-timers and children and grand-children of old-timers who still do hands-on labor. Lobstermen, couple of boatyards. But they're aging out.
And so, segregation by class.
It's not a universal thing, the vote to not comply was quite close - a lot of people here would be more than fine with complying.
The political angle of all of this is that the folks who instigated the vote against complying were notable local MAGAs, and the folks who voting against compliance were likewise on that end of the spectrum.
I personally live in a neighborhood that sounds like it's a lot like yours. Neighbor across the street are a cop and nurse, to the right is a postal worker and the buyer for a museum gift shop, to the left is a retired local photo print shop owner and nurse. Folks behind us are a bit more upscale, but their street is a little more upscale, so I guess that makes sense.
Basically, we live in the starter home neighborhood of our town, closer to downtown Salem than to our own downtown. But even our more modest neighborhood is likely out of reach for a lot of middle class working folks. We bought in 2002, we would likely never be able to do so now.
There are lots of similar stories to tell from around here. The schools in my upper middle class town are not so great, because we don't pay well, because people DO NOT WANT TO PAY TAXES and the wealthier folks in town just send their kids to the private school. Salem is running into conflict over a proposal to allow a very limited kind of multi-family housing - basically, in-law units that could be rented or used for extended family housing.
The town I live in is quite old - settled in 1629, mostly by fishermen and somewhat famously by drunks and ne'er do wells who couldn't get along with the Puritans in Salem. It has a history as a working town - fishing, boat building and related trades, light industry - there was even a small airplane factory here at one point. But those folks are getting pushed out. The ones who are still here are largely folks who've been here a really long time and got in before the big real estate gold rush(es). Or come from families who've been here forever.
The folks to our right bought their place a couple of years ago. It's a bog standard mid-century suburban colonial, 3 bed 1 1/2 bath, 1/8 acre plot. It went for almost $900K. They're working people - postal worker and museum gift shop buyer - so maybe there's some family money there, who knows. But holy crap, that's a lot of money for a perfectly nice but totally unremarkable house in a perfectly nice but totally unremarkable neighborhood.
That's the scene here.

They do not prompt wealthy college-educated folks living in islands of privilege to welcome cops, welders, nurses, and carpenters into their neighborhoods. They certainly and absolutely *DO NOT* prompt those people to do anything that would make lower-income housing more available in their communities, because that would put the assessed values of their own lovely homes at risk. And if the schools in their areas are not up to snuff, they quite often respond by sending their kids to private school, rather than take whatever steps would be needed to improve the local public schools.
Without going into the gory details of my own situation, I can tell you that I live this stuff. Live around it, live with it.
I have the recurring feeling that I am living in a different universe. This town is chock full of highly educated people. Has been since I was growing up here in the 1950s. (The town was a twentieth the size then, but its character hasn't changed much.) A lot of my neighbors are college educated; a couple used to teach college.
But my next door neighbor is a cop. (Not sure where. San Francisco maybe?) The guy a couple doors down is a farrier. (Yes really.) Great folks, not particularly well educated; one says he still marvels that he managed to graduate high school. In short, nothing like the class segregation described.
The town is mostly single family houses; archetypal suburbia. But there are also apartment buildings. No more houses being built the last decade or two; we ran out of space. But new apartment buildings are still going up. Afordable ones; at least what passes for affordable for California.
Like I say, a different universe. Not that I doubt for a minute that the problem exists. Just that it's outside my lived experience.

In this interview, an urban warfare expert, who has frequently been in Gaza, describes the current situation as unprecedented. One reason is that, unlike most urban warfare scenarios, where civilians can evacuate combat zones, in Gaza, civilians are compelled to remain in the heart of the fighting.
"John Spencer is a retired U.S. Army Major and leading expert on urban warfare, known for his frontline experience, strategic insights, and influential writing on modern combat in cities."
War Expert Debunks Gaza Lies - John Spencer

Here is a really good discussion between Ezra Klein and Philippe Sands about Gaza and genocide:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-philippe-sands.html
Sands pretty much has the same position I have: it is pretty clear that it is genocide but endlessly debating the matter is a distraction from the daily horror and might even be counterproductive. Obviously, nobody cares what I think and why should they, but Sands, as both a prominent human rights lawyer and author of several books on the matter, including one about the "inventors " of the words "genocide" and "crimes against humanity", has a bit more weight to throw around.
A propos de rien: Hannah Arendt seems to be all the rage in certain circles of the US intelligentsia, which is great since we need eclectic but sharp and principled thinkers now more than ever, but please learn how to pronounce her name correctly: the stress is on the the first syllable, not the second.

It seems to me that the Mets hat thing is a way of trying to experience goodwill and a human connection between groups who may not have many other interests or passions in common.
For the first 3/4 or more of the 20th century, baseball was one of the things that bound people together in this country. Rich or poor, black or white, city or country -- people, whether they followed the game closely or not, were sufficiently aware to be able to talk about it. Their favorite team might not be the local one, but nobody got too exercised about that.
I think two things happened. One was technological: television. Baseball games can be readily followed on radio (presuming good broadcasters, which most were). But football is a TV game. You can't really appreciate what is happening without seeing things unfold. Somehow, football seems much more divisive than baseball.
The other was cultural. It became de rigueur for the upper classes to look down on the game. One could be interested, and many were. But showing interest was not the done thing. If you must talk about sports, talk about something lacrosse, which the lower classes don't do.
What that Mets hat does is show an interest in breaking down that barrier. And a refusal to sneer at the people he's talking to.

Sorry, I posted that before I saw russell's and nous's. nous: thanks for further link. I read the synopsis which refers to it tangentially, but will certainly follow up.
russell: I hear you. And I can only hope that a lot of other people reading the NYT are less subtle than you, and take the general theme of the piece (segregation by income and education) seriously when they may not have seen it in quite that way before.
It's easier to be virtuous when your larder is full.
A truer word was never spoke.

Clarification: if it wasn't obvious, by "the ways and customs of an utterly foreign culture" I didn't mean Greek v English, I meant rich v poor.

It seems to me that the Mets hat thing is a way of trying to experience goodwill and a human connection between groups who may not have many other interests or passions in common
Yes, I think that is correct. And yes, I agree that trying to make connections and find common ground are good things. And yes, I understand that the motivations of the callow art student in the Pulp song are quite different.
In general, I think Brooks is a decent person.
But I also think there is, probably inevitably, a limit to the degree to which someone from Brooks' background and in Brooks' position can understand and speak for the experience and interests of people who do not share his advantages. Mets hat or not.
Brooks tends to frame things in moralizing terms. I think he does that honestly, because it seems like his personal values and interests lead him to think in those categories. Which I don't fault him for, exactly, but I think it causes him to miss the mark in a lot of ways. And it also makes him seem like something of a scold. To me, anyway.
His argument often seems to be "Gee, we should be better people". Well, OK, yeah, I guess we should all be better people. But transforming the general character of the public doesn't seem like a particularly practical approach to what are actually, in many cases, systemic problems. Problems amenable to concrete solutions, solutions that you could actually implement. And that would actually make people's lives better in ways that would, in turn, make it a hell of a lot easier to be "better people".
It's easier to be virtuous when your larder is full.
And that's probably enough from me about Brooks. He strikes me as a basically decent person. I just can't think of anything I've read of his that seemed especially useful. And, intentional or not, I personally find what I take to be the moralizing tone of his work kind of condescending.
Just my opinion, offered more or less as an aside.

So much fascinating info, thank you all! It's quite clear that my impression of the relevant southern states' educational standards was seriously out of date. I haven't yet read nous's Reichman link on CA higher education, but I will certainly do so - I'm particularly interested in the Humanities subsidising STEM aspect.
The story about wearing a Mets hat to break the ice with "ordinary people" just makes me think of that Pulp song. You know the one.
russell, I think Common People is a brilliant song, but to me it describes a different phenomenon. The girl in it is acting as a tourist, sampling the ways and customs of an utterly foreign culture. It seems to me that the Mets hat thing is a way of trying to experience goodwill and a human connection between groups who may not have many other interests or passions in common (but who may find they do when they start to talk). I think it is like when people from completely different backgrounds and experiences love the same music, and can talk passionately and knowledgeably about it. The ability to do this, and to value it, seems to me to be a good thing.

Isn't what you are describing fallout from Prop 13, which capped property taxes, which was the mechanism that funded education?
Prop 13 contributed, certainly. But, as nous notes, it's far from the whole story.
Property taxes are a big part of funding primary and secondary education. But they aren't the only source. Also, the problem of reduced results has occurred even in places where there is relatively rapid turnover of home ownership. (Taxes weren't capped by Prop 13. It just froze assessments of property values, on which taxes are based, until the property changes hands.)
Funding for the University of California, and for the state university system, is totally unrelated to property taxes. It comes directly from the state budget, and from whatever tuition gets charged to make up the shortfalls. We could provide more funding from the state budget, and so reduce tuition. We chose, and continue to choose, not to.

These are the priorities of politicians on the left.
Isn't what you are describing fallout from Prop 13, which capped property taxes, which was the mechanism that funded education? And Prop 13 didn't have anything to do with the left and had everything to do with people who labeled themselves as conservatives.

I'd be interested to know whether this is a well known phenomenon
The NAEP stats.
To the degree that the states Brooks calls out have made good progress in their educational outcomes, I applaud them. No snark. Well done, I hope they continue. In general they've advanced from pretty bad to somewhere between not-so-bad and not bad at all, which is actually a big jump, and worth celebrating.
Good job. Keep it up.
If you look at the NAEP stuff you'll see that educational outcomes are not an especially blue state / red state thing. California doesn't do very well, Utah does. IMO it's more about the culture and history of the place, and what resources they bring to the table. Money, yes, but also an investment in the future mindset.
At the risk of coming off like a coastal elitist snob, I note that my adopted home state of Massachusetts does quite well. We aren't smarter than people in other states, we just have a long history of valuing education. A lot of the folks who settled the area were literate people, unusually so for their time. They valued education, and so they created pretty good schools. That culture persisted, and thus we do well on the NAEP stuff.
I'm glad to see that some states that historically have lagged in that area are taking steps to improve. Well done, carry on.
As an aside, I'll also say that Brooks annoys me. Perennially. I think he's sincere and I appreciate what I see as a real lack of cynicism. He seems to honestly be trying to make best sense of the world and his own life.
But I also think he's remarkably clueless. The story about wearing a Mets hat to break the ice with "ordinary people" just makes me think of that Pulp song. You know the one.
I mean, he is genuinely a lifelong fan of the Mets, so by all means wear the hat. And if that helps break the ice, go for it. But I just don't think he's able to see outside of his white-shoe bubble.
He's just not a guy I think I need moral direction from. And that seems to be his primary way of framing his thoughts.
I hope Mr. Brooks will forgive me if I misjudge him here.
And that's enough stream of consciousness from me for one night.

With Brooks, you have to take care with any evidence he offers. Yes, there is a Southern surge, but the states lauded (specifically Mississippi and Alabama) have historically been on the bottom of any ranking, so I suspect that them moving up is partly statistical. The data is from the NEAP, which only checks students in the 4th, 8th and 12th grade and the bulk of the surge comes from a leap in 4th grade, important to be sure, but it also corresponds with increased federal mandates on testing from No Child left behind in 2002 under Bush and the revised act signed by Obama. Mississippi didn't even have any state level assessments until it joined the PARCC for one year and then opted out.
The NEAP uses a weighted average of subgroups and gives only 4 classifications, Advanced, Proficient, Basic and Below Basic. Now, it's a good thing that more students from Below Basic are lifted up. However, there is both a ceiling effect. Again, I don't think that this means the Southern Surge is all bullshit, but it's not like Mississippi and Alabama are becoming powerhouses, it is that they are becoming more like other states.
The last thing is that the Southern Surge can be partially attributed to the pandemic. Every place had massive drops because of the pandemic. I'm not surprised that states with less developed educational infrastructure (like Mississippi and Alabama) could get up more quickly. The Southern Surge is attributable to Mississippi and Alabama moving up in the rankings, but doesn't really talk about how and why other states dropped to make that happen.
I don't think that the Southern Surge is all hype, I've been reading a lot about the 'Science of Reading' approach, which replaces the Balanced Literacy approach and seems to have made a big difference in these cases. But I suspect that Southern states have had an advantage in shifting to a new system because the teachers in the old system were often under-trained or left to their own devices, so it has been easier to introduce it.

class in America.
Yes, once upon a time there was a greater mix of higher-educated white collar professionals and non-college-grad working people in neighborhoods, schools, and social organizations.
It was like that when I was a kid. Doctors, lawyers, business executives lived in the same neighborhoods as cops, plumbers, local mom-n-pop business owners. Their kids went to the same schools, familes went to the same churches, etc. The doctors and lawyers might live in nicer houses, but still in the same town and general area. So, a while back, but not that far. In living memory, mine at least.
What's different? Among other things, higher-educated white collar professionals make a sh*t-ton more money relative to their non-college-grad working class than they did back then.
This is from 2015 and EPI are a bunch of commies, of course, but it gets the idea across.
Higher-educated white collar professionals used to pay more in taxes. Non-college-educated working people used to be unionized a lot more than they are now.
I don't mean to be reductionist about it, but the increased income gap goes a long way to explaining the class-based segregation Brooks talks about. IMO.
Maybe instead of waxing nostalgic about the loss of our common values and social bonds, we could tax wealthy people a little more and support organized labor.
Sometimes things actually are as simple as that.
As far as the summit goes, it's just another episode in the Donald and Vlad show as far as I can tell. Trump clearly admires Putin, he adores bullies, autocrats, and "tough guys", and Putin checks all of those boxes. He's a Putin wanna-be, and if there is a more despicable role model on the face of the planet than Vladimir Putin, I'm at a loss as to who that might be.
I have no idea how things are going to play out in Ukraine, Canada and the EU will likely have something to say about it all, and Ukraine by god most certainly will. But it's pretty clear to me that Trump is not going to do anything of significance to hinder Putin's desire to annex eastern Ukraine for now, after which he will likely rebuild a bit and return for the rest of the meal.
Trump somehow combines the venality and corruption of Nixon with a breathtaking ignorance and incompetence all his own. He is a deeply stupid man. It's remarkable.

I'm actually pleasantly surprised at the outcome. Far less bad than I had expected. Far less.
I read some griping about Putin being "honored" by being welcomed on US soil. Putin may feel honored (fat chance!). But will anyone else be impressed? Will anyone change their opinion of Putin? No and No.

Putin left Trump virtually speechless....given Trump's gonoerrhea mouth, quite a feat if you ask me. I wonder if the KGB hacked the Epstein files.
That Ukrainians will continue to die trying to deal with these monsters is absolutely enraging.

Spent some time off and on this week adding a first cut illumination correction to the toy software for processing images of documents.
Original snapshot taken with a handheld iPad here.
Result of correcting various geometry impairments -- curled pages, perspective, orientation -- here.
First cut at doing some illumination correction here. The approach I've taken seems to do well at correcting problems caused purely by the light source being off to the side (darker sections where page curl has the surface normal vector pointing away from the light, brighter where the normal vector is pointing towards the light). The shadow in the lower right corner is from the iPad and will require a different approach to identify and correct. Or more likely, when I get closer to production I'll arrange things so the camera doesn't cast shadows.

Side note on "smart" and "posh": Bryan Ferry is an interesting case. Working class, but attended that crucible of 60s upward (and other directions) mobility, art school. Fine Art degree, then teaching til music career. Clearly an aesthete by temperament (easily seen), he wears Savile Row suits and hunts to hounds (was married for 22 years to an upper class girl who hunted from the time she was 12). Of course this does not make him "posh", but really in today's world it's hard to miss his identification.
All this being said, it is good to be reminded that when I pronounce on "normal usage" in the UK, it is coming from a particular place of (as I said before) age, education and social class. I must remember this when giving such confident declarations in the future!

wj: to make your strategy work properly it requires generating an actual random choice.
PRO TIP: #2 pencils used for multiple-choice have 6 sides: using a pen to impress 'dots' in the wood, 1 dot, 2 dots, etc for the sides. Need a random number? Roll the pencil. Fast and easy.
Computer tests mess that up, dammit.

my perception of American English has both "crafty" and "cunning" as something that is intentionally deceptive
When my step-son was born, my wife's Scottish then mother-in-law took a look at him and said "What a cunning child!".
One of the most interesting things to me in language is that way that words in languages that are more or less imposed on people - English on the Scots, in this case - get re-purposed to suit local meanings.
See also "overstand" in Jamaican patois, which re-tools "understand" to have a richer meaning, one that is not completely captured by any standard English word (except perhaps "grok").