Journalism for the few


Dorothy Thompson leaves the White House after a visit with Roosevelt, May 1940. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

Today’s substack from Heather Cox Richardson contains a sharp warning about what Trump will do to those who oppose him, if he ever gets power again:

“On Saturday, September 7, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump predicted that his plan to deport 15 to 20 million people currently living in the United States would be ‘bloody.’ He also promised to prosecute his political opponents, including, he wrote, lawyers, political operatives, donors, illegal voters, and election officials. Retired chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley told journalist Bob Woodward that Trump is ‘a fascist to the core … the most dangerous person to this country.’

“On October 14, Trump told Fox News Channel host Maria Bartiromo that he thought enemies within the United States were more dangerous than foreign adversaries and that he thought the military should stop those ‘radical left lunatics’ on Election Day.”

Our mediocre media soft-pedals Trump’s overt fascism. Most Americans are strangely unconcerned about what Trump intends to do if he ever gets power again, because journalists are afraid that to tell them would sound shrill and unobjective. We even have a new term for how the media normalize Trump’s depravity to avoid sounding shrill — “sanewashing.”

But scholars like Heather Cox Richardson don’t have to care what Republicans or centrists think about what she writes. She writes for a smaller set of people. She has, I believe, 1.3 million subscribers on Substack, as well as 2 million followers on Facebook. That’s a lot of people, but it’s only 1.3 percent of the American population.

Richardson writes today about Dorothy Thompson, a journalist who was expelled from Germany in 1934. Thompson was a rare journalist who risked sounding shrill when what she was writing about was gruesomely ugly. She had written in 1931 that Hitler was a man of “startling insignificance.”

In Harper’s Magazine in 1934, she wrote:

“He is formless, almost faceless, a man whose countenance is a caricature, a man whose framework seems cartilaginous, without bones. He is inconsequent and voluble, ill poised and insecure. He is the very prototype of the little man.”

It seems that Dorothy Thompson analyzed everyone she met in the same way she analyzed Hitler. She wrote a fascinating piece for Harper’s Magazine in 1941, Who Goes Nazi? She asks us to imagine a parlor game at a large gathering of people. She describes twelve people in the room, whom she labels A through L, and asks whether they would “go Nazi.” She wants us to see how It Could Happen Here. People today are just the same as people were in 1941. For persons A through L, which types seem familiar? Whom do you like, and dislike, the most? Which one is Elon Musk? Is there a Liz Cheney in the room? For those of us who would never go Nazi, why?

It’s an odd paradox, and only the best of journalists and historians can get at it — how it can be that some of history’s greatest monsters also are pathetic little creeps.

Here’s another paradox. Given any major issue, the higher the stakes and the greater the controversy, the harder it is to find out what is really going on. Sources that depend on large audiences have to water things down so as not be accused of taking sides. But, somewhere in the fog of propaganda, there will be a few who are doing their best to get at the truth. Dorothy Thompson did it then. Heather Cox Richardson is doing it now.

Update: The New York Times seems to have had a fit of conscience:

As Election Nears, Kelly Warns Trump Would Rule Like a Dictator: John Kelly, the Trump White House’s longest-serving chief of staff, said that he believed that Donald Trump met the definition of a fascist.

The 2024-2025 Covid and flu vaccines


The influenza B virus. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

I had not had a Covid vaccination since 2021, and I had never had a flu shot (though, lucky for me, it has been more than 30 years since I’ve had the flu). Because I’m going to be on two long flights and two long train rides next month, I figured it was time to go get some shots.

At first I thought it was strange when my doctor’s office said that they don’t have the vaccines. They referred me to the dominant pharmacy chain here, CVS. Then I realized that it’s probably not efficient for small rural practices to keep those vaccines when the pharmacies are doing the job with greater efficiency. I’d never had a shot at a pharmacy before; this is new to me. But I understand that, since 2009, all fifty American states have given pharmacists the right to vaccinate. The pharmacist who gave me the shots said I was her 40th flu shot that day.

I went to a CVS in the little town of Walnut Cove at 6 p.m. on a Friday. The sign said that walk-ins are welcome. I had some questions, and I found that the pharmacist was very well informed. She answered all my questions. Though proof of immunization is not required at present for airline passengers, I asked for some documentation just in case. She gave me two printouts. For the Covid vaccine, I got the “MODERNA 2024-2025 COVID 12YR+,” in which the 12YR+ means that it’s the version of the vaccine for people older than 12. For the flu vaccine, I got the “FLUAD TRIVALENT 2024-2025 SYR,” from a company named Sequirus, Inc. This vaccine is optimized for people over 65. It includes something called MF59, an oil-in-water emulsion that, for reasons not fully understood, increases the effectiveness of the vaccine, which may be important for older people whose immune systems aren’t what they used to be.

The shots cost me nothing. My Humana Medicare Advantage coverage paid for it. I can see online in my Humana account that Humana paid CVS $89.71 for the flu shot and $156.13 for the Covid shot.

As expected, the next day I didn’t feel exactly sick; malaise is probably the best word. I had a low-grade fever of 99.7 the day after, but my temperature was back to normal on day 2. My upper arm is a little sore, but only a little. That’s just what we are told to expect. It’s OK to get the Covid vaccine and the flu vaccine at the same time, but you probably want to time it so that you have a couple of days off to deal with the after-effects.

Modern medicine is a miracle. Yes, drug companies want to gouge us where they can. But I also think that vaccine technologies are far more advanced and far safer than lovers of conspiracy theories will ever admit. The flu and Covid vaccines are products of international cooperation. In addition to the American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there is the World Health Organization and the health agencies of other advanced countries, all cooperating on the science and delivery of these vaccines. There is a huge amount of global research on vaccines and their effectiveness.

I have never had Covid. And, by the way, you can still get four free Covid test kits from the U.S. Department of Health & Human services by going here.

The Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott Club

As an amateur scholar of Sir Walter Scott’s novels, I’m very interested in non-amateur Sir Walter Scott scholarship. As far as I can tell, though, not all that many people pursue an academic interest in Sir Walter Scott. Scott has fallen out of fashion. As I’ve argued before, we’re overdue for a Walter Scott revival.

From Googling, many months ago I discovered the Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott Club. They are very serious. I’ve watched some of their YouTube lectures. They know who today’s Sir Walter Scott scholars are, and they bring ’em in for lectures. The median age of the group seems to be pretty high. That doesn’t surprise me. I don’t expect younger people to take an interest in Scott until somebody — somebody please! — makes a beautiful movie from, say, The Heart of Mid-Lothian.

The club is 130 years old. Princess Anne attended their dinner on their 100th anniversary.

It happens that, when I’m in Scotland next month, there will be a lecture based on a novel about Scott. Ken has secured tickets for us.

The lecture is at the New Club, Edinburgh, Edinburgh’s oldest social club, which I suppose is why there is a dress code for the lecture. Fine. That will be a reason (if I even needed another one) for me to take a couple of my Harris tweed jackets back to their homeland for a wee visit.

Lo mein


Tofu and cashew lo mein over baby bok choi

I promise to back off on food photos soon. It’s just that I’m inspired by the attitude toward food and cooking that accompanies the fall change of weather. Instead of dreading heat from cooking in the kitchen, the attitude reverses: Get double service from the heat of cooking by both cooking food and warming the house.

Whole wheat spaghetti makes an entirely agreeable lo mein noodle. My farmer neighbors Brittany and Richard grew the bok choi. A neighbor gave me the sweet red pepper.

Pumpkins are a superfood


A baked pumpkin. I’ll scrape the goody out with a spoon. This pumpkin became soup. See below.

It’s pumpkin season, after all, so I hope you can put up with my pumpkin evangelism a little longer.

Once upon a time in America, a time that I can remember, everyone in rural America acquired fresh apples in the fall. Lots of people had their own apple tree. Those who didn’t have their own apple tree probably had neighbors who did. And many people lived near orchards where you could buy apples by the bushel or the peck. A family of four to six people could easily use a bushel of apples by Thanksgiving. If you bought enough, they’d last until Christmas, because apples keep well.

Pumpkin pie is as American as apple pie. Maybe pumpkins weren’t as much of an autumn must-have as apples, but plenty of people also acquired “eating pumpkins” for fall. Pumpkins keep just as well as apples, so there was your pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving, and maybe Christmas, too.

These days, you can buy fresh apples all year. I have no idea how that works, because, traditionally, any apples that lasted through the winter would be pretty shriveled by spring. In C.J. Sansom’s Shardlake novels, set in Tudor England, the London womenfolk sometimes sent the menfolk to market to get apples, even shriveled ones, because apples were an important food. As for pumpkins these days, you’d better get them before Halloween, because after that there won’t be any. That is a shame. Because pumpkins, properly stored, will easily keep all winter.

I came across an article at BBC News about pumpkins as an international superfood. They will grow in poor soil, they’re drought tolerant, they’re very nutritious — including the seeds and even the leaves — and they keep well without needing any refrigeration.

Pumpkins also are a good “prepper” crop. A few years ago I supplied some of my neighbors with seeds for what we call “little pumpkins.” The proper name of the little pumpkins is Long Island cheese squash. Several of my neighbors grow little pumpkins now, and each year they keep the seed for next year’s crop. A good stash of homegrown little pumpkins could help make winter a lot more bearable if something happened to our usual supply lines.

Pumpkin soup is a challenge. A savory stock is essential. I like to add just a touch of nutmeg and a teaspoon or two of sugar.


A neighbor gave me the little pumpkin for the soup. The local farmers from whom I buy vegetables grew the lettuce. I baked the bread for the grilled cheese.

Gardens rebounded here after Helene


Pesto with sweet peppers and walnuts

This was a hard gardening year here. During midsummer there was a prolonged period of heat and drought. It was so bad that the deer ate tomato plants and the leaves of young oak trees, something I’ve never seen before. Gardens without irrigation were ruined. After the rain returned, the deer of course went back to their usual diets. In spite of the rough summer, the spring and fall hay crops were good, so the horses and cattle should eat well this winter, even though, like the deer, the pasture animals had a rough time of it during the summer.

After the rain from Hurricane Helene in late September, my basil plants rebounded. Today I pretty much clipped all the new growth. The first frost probably is not far off. Basil is precious.

I’ll be getting fresh vegetables through late November from my local young farmers, Brittany and Richard — broccolini, baby bok choi, sweet potatoes, sweet peppers, lettuces, beets, and such. Last week I got the last of the summer okra. I’ve been roasting it and tossing it into pasta dishes with parmesan.

Highland Cathedral: What you need to know

Wait for the bagpipe! It starts at 0:32.

I’ll be in Scotland for a couple of weeks in late November. I’ll have more about that when the time comes. I’m planning to write some blog posts from Scotland. For now, I’ve been looking for interesting things to do in Edinburgh.

If I could have my choice of musical events, I’d want to hear the Scottish Fiddle Orchestra. But they apparently do only three or so concerts a year, and there’s nothing in November. I’m leaning toward the Royal Scottish National Orchestra at Usher Hall in Edinburgh. A Beethoven piano concerto and a suite from Swan Lake are on the program. Still, I’d like to find something more Scottish.

“Highland Cathedral” is a piece that sounds ancient. But actually it was written in 1982 by some German musicians, for a highland games in Germany. It has become so popular that many people would like to see it become the Scottish national anthem. Here are three versions of it on YouTube. Given that the piece was written in Germany, I don’t think I need to apologize for leading with a performance by the Johann Strauss Orchestra in Maastricht. It’s the most polished version. But…

⬆︎ This version by the Edinburgh Military Tattoo is very good. It takes a really good band to play in tune, especially with as many instruments as there are here. The Edinburgh Military Tattoo has superb, and superbly disciplined, musicians. The bagpipe players are true professionals. I believe that’s Princess Anne in the audience at 3:10.

⬆︎ And here is the Scottish Fiddle Orchesta at Usher Hall in Edinburgh, along with the hall’s organ. This is the least polished performance, yet still very good.

There is an otherworldly magic in the sound of bagpipes. I don’t think you have to be Scottish to fall under the spell.

Helene, mother of mushrooms


Click here for high-resolution version.

It has been a week since Hurricane Helene brought such destruction to the Appalachian Mountains. Here in the foothills there wasn’t much damage. But the tropical weather than brought Helene has lingered, with warm days, humid nights, and some showers. It’s the perfect weather for mushrooms.

An online site that attempts to identify mushrooms from a photo thinks that the orange mushroom above probably is Amanita jacksonii. If that’s what it is, it’s edible, though I would never eat a wild mushroom. Mushrooms from the amanita family are common here, including Amanita muscaria, which is a hallucinogenic (though toxic) mushroom.


Probably a Chlorophyllum molybdites, a poisonous mushroom. The mushroom in the photo is just a youngster. A day later its cap was eight inches in diameter.

Pumpkins rule! Well, some pumpkins.


In today’s nomenclature, the two pumpkins in the back are “pie pumpkins.” The pumpkin in the front would be an “heirloom” pumpkin.

What is the world coming to? What once upon a time we would have called a pumpkin is now called an heirloom pumpkin. True pumpkins were in danger of being displaced by the large, ugly, inedible pumpkin-like objects that people (for some reason) buy for Halloween. I’m all for jack-o-lanterns, especially if they’re made from proper fairy-tale pumpkins. But the real purpose of pumpkins is to make them into pie. I’ll stop there, because regular readers are no doubt tired of my annual rant about how hard it can be to find proper pumpkins.

I’m about 14 miles from the nearest pumpkin farm. I stopped by the pumpkin farm this morning to get my first fix of fall pumpkins. The lady at the pumpkin farm told me that it was only four years ago that they started growing “heirloom pumpkins.” They sell out, so I assume that sanity is returning to the pumpkin market. People were hauling away pumpkins in little garden wagons and loading six or eight of them into their SUV’s. My guess is that 99.9 percent of those pumpkins will decorate front porches and will never have the honor of being made into pie.

When there are pumpkins in the field, there are acorns in the woods. The acorn crop this year seems to be good. That’s good news for the squirrels and the deer.


⬆︎ “Heirloom pumpkins” on the left, and ugly pumpkin-like objects on the right.


⬆︎ The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max are the first iPhones to be able to shoot close-ups, or “macro” shots. The lens will focus as close as 1 inch.

North Carolina in the news

North Carolina, where I live, is normally a backwater. But two things have put North Carolina in the news recently. The first is the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene in the North Carolina mountains near Asheville. The second is the possibility that Kamala Harris will win in North Carolina on November 5. Trump won North Carolina in 2016 and 2020.

It seems that everyone including the media expected the worst damage from Hurricane Helene to be in Florida and areas farther south. But the storm dumped more than 20 inches of rain in some areas of western North Carolina. In those mountains, the streams and rivers often run through narrow valleys, and that’s where the flooding occurred. I live about a hundred miles east of the heavy rain, and it wasn’t very bad here. But a neighbor, who also is the chief of the local volunteer fire department, is among the crews who were sent into western North Carolina to help with rescue and cleanup. He is spending that time helping to recover the bodies of people who drowned, and he says that the final toll will be much higher than what is being reported at present. The state has told people to consider all roads in western North Carolina closed. Even Interstate 40 was partially washed out. The video of the flooding is horrifying, with such things as an entire hospital partially submerged and people standing on the roof.

Trump, and all the Republicans on the North Carolina ballot, are going to be dragged down by the Republican candidate for governor of North Carolina, Mark Robinson. Robinson is such an idiot and such a psychopath that even some Republicans can see what he is in spite of the usual Republican adoration of idiots and psychopaths. Some polls have Robinson running 14 points behind the Democratic candidate for governor, Mark Stein.

Voters in North Carolina sometimes split on statewide races. For example, though Trump carried North Carolina in 2020, North Carolina elected a Democratic governor in the same election, Roy Cooper. Republicans were so terrified of Robinson dragging down the Republican ticket that they tried to get him to withdraw before they decided to double down and back him. North Carolina’s 16 electoral votes are likely to be critical in the 2024 election for president, maybe even decisive.

My unscientific and unquantifiable reading is that North Carolina is very likely to go for Harris. I think there is more Trump fatigue and more Trump remorse than the polls can capture. Republicans who are tired of Trump, or even sick of Trump, have to keep quiet about it or they will catch MAGA hell. I suspect that quite a few women will lie to their menfolk about how they vote. The right-wing North Carolina legislature usually cooks up some sort of bonkers culture war issue to inflame Republicans during election years, such as the “bathroom bill” of 2016. This year there is nothing like that. This year Republicans, poor things, are not quite sure what they’re supposed to be raging about.

As in 2020, this year I’ll be a poll observer for the North Carolina Democratic Party. Early voting in North Carolina starts October 17. In those states where Republicans are motivated to steal elections, lots of lawyers from out of state come in to help keep an eye on things and to stand in the way of Republican attempts to mess with the election. The state party operates a “boiler room” of lawyers in Raleigh who monitor the voting in each county through a system of volunteers. Online training for the volunteers is required. There’s a hotline, and an app, that the volunteers use for reporting to Raleigh. North Carolina statutes allow for poll observers who are permitted inside the voting area. They can listen to (though not interfere with) the interactions between poll workers and voters. They can watch the machines that tabulate the ballots and take photos of the tabulator screens before the polls open and after the polls close so that the number of ballots cast can be monitored. If poll workers turn a voter away, poll observers can follow the voter out of the voting area and inquire about what happened. If a poll observer thinks that poll workers are not following the law, they can politely intercede with the poll’s chief judge — and call the boiler room. I’ll also be attending the meetings of the county board of elections during the canvassing of the vote required by North Carolina law.

In my county, which Trump won by 78 percent in 2020 and 77 percent in 2016, Republicans have very little motive to try anything sneaky. But all of North Carolina’s 100 counties will be monitored by Democratic volunteers and the boiler room in Raleigh. If the vote is close, there is no limit to the dirty tricks that Republicans will use to try to steal the election. Democrats, at both the state and national levels, are very aware this year that Democrats need to win by such large margins that Republicans would be unable to steal the election, even with help from the Supreme Court, which will be slobbering to step in and hand it to Trump if Republicans can find a reason.