Posts Tagged ‘music’
“Follow the money”*…
The Trump administration’s immigration policy has been a bonanza for the private prison sector– as Vanessa Romo reports, for two companies with ties to the administration in particular…
America’s two largest private prison companies, CoreCivic and GEO Group, are reporting a combined $1.4 billion in quarterly revenue over the spring as immigration detention closes in on record levels.
Those revenues announced Thursday do not include net proceeds of $1.6 billion made by CoreCivic after the recent sale of four of their facilities to the Department of Homeland Security. Patrick Swindle [!], CoreCivic’s President and CEO, told investors on an earnings call that that works out to an average rate of $307,000 per bed.
The earnings — from April through June of this year — come as the U.S. is holding almost 66,000 people in immigration detention, nearing record levels not seen since January, according to Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a nonpartisan research center. Both companies say they’re also finding other revenue opportunities, like ankle monitors for Haitian immigrants who recently lost their protected immigration status.
Swindle said that CoreCivic’s total revenue went up by just over 27% this spring compared to the same quarter last year, for a total of $684.9 million. CoreCivic exceeded expectations in a period that included the government shutdown, Swindle said. This was accomplished in part by lowering operating costs — meaning the business of detaining people is becoming cheaper — and because of more people being put in detention.
CoreCivic’s sales of detention centers to the government won’t be reflected until next quarter — but they are part of a larger strategy to meet President Trump’s goal of having 100,000 people in detention at once. CoreCivic made a deal to continue operating the detention centers and also hopes to build more. Meanwhile, GEO Group says they’re also in talks to do the same.
GEO Group CEO George Zoley said in his company’s earnings call also on Thursday that thanks to 2025 contracts, total revenues are up to $732.1 million — an increase of nearly $96 million or 15% — over the same period last year.
GEO Group’s government ties run deep. Former GEO Group executive David Venturella is the acting director of ICE. In a recent letter, he told lawmakers he has divested his GEO Group stock.
President Trump’s border czar Tom Homan was also a paid consultant for GEO Group before joining the government, and former Attorney General Pam Bondi lobbied for GEO Group before she was appointed.
President Trump also has financial stakes in the two companies, according to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics. An analysis of Trump’s most recent financial disclosure by CREW last month found that the president’s brokers have made 29 trades of private prison stocks since he returned to office. According to the study, the first purchases were made on the 10th day of his second term. The total amount bought and sold was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars split between GEO Group and CoreCivic.
In Thursday’s call, GEO Group noted that their ankle monitoring sales are up. The electronic devices are part of the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program contract it has with ICE, along with smartwatches and the SmartLink phone app that help the government keep tabs on immigrants outside of detention, Zoley said.
Zoley also told investors that GPS-tracking ankle monitors in particular will likely keep climbing now that Temporary Protected Status for Haitian immigrants has ended.
“Because of this new policy shift as to who will be subject to this immigration enforcement like … the Haitians, we could see a significant increase in the number of people in the ISAP program,” Zoley said, adding “most of them, we believe, would be placed under the ankle monitoring supervision.” He noted that “the app is far less expensive than the ankle monitors.”…
On those “sales of detention center to the government”: it appears the administration has retreated from overpaying for warehouses needy of retrofitting in area that don’t want them, opting instead to buy currently-operating facilities.
The misery market: “Private prisons announce $1.4 billion in revenue as immigration detentions climb,” from @npr.org.
* “Deep Throat” (subsequently identified as Mark Felt), William Goldman in the screenplay for All the President’s Men
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As we grapple with graft, we might recall that it was on this date in 1724 that Johann Sebastian Bach led the first performance of his Nimm von uns, Herr, du treuer Gott, BWV 101, a chorale cantata based on “Vater unser im Himmelreich“ (Our Father in Heaven), a Lutheran hymn, a paraphrase of the Lord’s Prayer in German by Martin Luther.
See/hear it here.
“All is change”*…
The Wikipedia article on the Ship of Theseus has changed entirely since its inception.
A paradoxical thought experiment made meta: “The Same Boat,” from Greg Ross in his wonderful blog, Futility Closet.
* Euripedes, Heracles (and others, e.g., Marcus Aurelius, echoing Heraclitus)
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As we contemplate conundra, we might recall that it was on this date in 1971 that the mix was completed on David Bowie’s “Changes,” which had been recorded nine days earlier at Trident Studios in London. Co-produced by Bowie and Ken Scott, it featured Rick Wakeman on piano and the musicians who would later become known as the Spiders from Mars—Mick Ronson, Trevor Bolder and Mick Woodmansey.
“Changes” is widely considered to be one of Bowie’s best songs and has appeared on many best-of lists. His biographers have suggested that the track is a manifesto of his entire career, predicting a constant change of musical styles: the first verse focuses on the compulsive nature of artistic reinvention and distancing oneself from the rock mainstream; the second verse concerns clashes between children and their parents, urging them to allow their children to be themselves as teenagers. Bowie frequently included the song in his live performances; it was the final song he performed on stage before his death in 2016.
See Bowie perform it here.
“What dreadful hot weather we have! It keeps one in a continual state of inelegance.”*…
Climatologist Zeke Hausfather on what’s turning out to be a scorching summer…
I’m generally pretty measured in how I discuss climate data. There has been only one time in recent years when I was truly shocked: when global temperatures came in for September 2023 at a full 0.5C warmer than any prior September on record. Once until today, that is. With the July runs now in from 667 ensemble members across 14 different seasonal forecast models, it looks like this year’s El Niño is not only very likely to be the strongest event since reliable records began – it may end up the strongest by a truly mind-blowing margin.
The multi-model median for the event’s peak (measured as detrended sea surface temperature anomalies in the Niño 3.4 region of the tropical Pacific) currently stands at 3.6C, roughly 0.8C hotter than the prior record of 2.75C set in 2015-16. For context, the gap between the strongest and the fifth strongest El Niño of the past 150 years is only about 0.5C. The models are forecasting something outside the envelope of anything we have ever observed [as the chart at the top illustrates].
A few things stand out in this figure. First, no event in a century and a half of observations has ever pushed meaningfully past 2.75C. The legendary 1877-78 event comes closest, in a statistical dead heat with 2015-16 (2.73C vs 2.75C, well within the uncertainty of 19th-century ship data). Second, the middle 80% of this year’s forecast ensemble sits entirely at or above that all-time record: even the low end of the plume (2.8C) grazes it. Around 91% of ensemble members exceed the 2015-16 record at their peak…
… What is remarkable here is not just the level but the trajectory. The 2026 event is developing faster than 1997-98, the previous gold standard for explosive El Niño onsets. And unlike 2015 which started its year already warm from a precursor event, this one launched from genuinely La Niña-ish conditions in January…
Read on the for the chilling-but-in-the-wrong-way details.
A ~90% chance of a record-setting event: “The Strongest El Niño Ever,” from @zekehausfather.com.
More detail– and opportunity to track the heat– at Zeke’s Climate Dashboard. And for related info, see also Climate.us— the volunteer-fielded “successor” to the now-suppressed Climate.gov.
* Jane Austen, in a 1796 letter to her elder sister, Casandra
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As we sweat it, we might send scorching birthday greetings to the sublime Martha Reeves; she was born on this date in 1941. A singer, she is best known for her work in Martha and the Vandellas, which scored several major Hot 100 hits, including “Nowhere to Run,” “Jimmy Mack,” “Dancing in the Street,” and of course, “Heat Wave.” In 1995, the group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; in 2023, Reeves was included on Rolling Stone‘s list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.
“You can have a healthy fossil-fuel balance sheet, or a relatively healthy planet”*…
The first two installments of what will be an on-going series from ProPublica and Drilled, covering fossil fuel companies in the 1990s who, even as they denied the reality of climate change, were quietly funding research that favored climate fixes that would protect their businesses…
An investigation by ProPublica and Drilled has found that fossil fuel companies have been funding climate research at prestigious U.S. universities for more than 30 years. Their support has helped amplify the work of scientists who promote the idea that we can stop the climate crisis without breaking our dependence on oil, gas, and coal.
The research produced by those schools in turn shaped global climate models, as well as the policy and technology solutions adopted by governments around the world.
Ultimately, it fostered a misperception that climate change could be solved without dramatically curtailing fossil fuels — a notion that has delayed emissions cuts by decades.
Corporate funders sponsored entire centers, paid the salaries of researchers, kept offices on campus and in some cases had veto power over projects.
Companies maintain they are supporting innovation and needed science. Universities say that with safeguards, sponsorship enhances research programs while preserving academic independence.
Still, the impact of funding constitutes a pattern that Benjamin Franta, an associate professor of climate litigation at University of Oxford, called the “colonization of academia.”…
“Why Carbon Capture Can’t Conceivably Solve Climate Change“- For decades, oil companies have funded universities’ research into climate change “solutions” that would not require the public to stop using oil and gas. Carbon capture is one of their favored ideas. One snag: It won’t fix the climate crisis. From Katie Worth and Lucas Waldron.
“How Oil Execs Shaped A Landmark Climate Study“- BP created an elite Princeton research center to address the climate problem without getting off fossil fuels. Its key work, a paper known as “Wedges,” shaped climate discourse for a generation. From Maddie Stone.
As the first piece concludes…
Climate experts know about the costs, technical troubles, and failures of CCS [Carbon Capture and Sequestration] test projects.
Yet many of them have continued to boost the technology, even as they have downplayed solutions showing greater progress.
For example, the same modelers who overestimated the potential of geological carbon storage repeatedly underestimated solar power — one of the energy technologies that would allow more oil to remain in the ground.
A distressing– but critically important– read. How the fossil fuel industry turned the plan to solve climate change into a plan to save itself: “Carbon Captured,” from @propublica.org and @drilledmedia.bsky.social.
And as a reminder that, while climate change is certainly reason enough, it’s by no means the only reason to care: “Five Americans die every hour from toxic vehicle emissions, study finds.”
* Bill McKibben
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As we face facts, we might give ourselves a short break on this, the anniversary of “Raspberry Beret,” by Prince & The Revolution, hitting #1 on the charts in 1985.
Here is the official video (now in 4K). Directed by his Purple Majesty himself, it features graphics and animation from Drew Takahashi, George Evelyn, and the crew at Colossal Pictures.
“It is generally understood that a party hardly ever goes the way it is planned or intended”*…
Scheduling note: as tomorrow is July 4, (Roughly) Daily will be off. Regular service will resume on July 5… and should continue uninterrupted for awhile. Meantime…
The “Great American State Fair,” ostensibly celebrating the 250th birthday of the U.S., is having a rocky run. After the talent for what was presented to them as a bi-partisan event largely withdrew, the Fair’s champion, President Trump, converted the opening into an unabashed “Trump Rally.” Thereafter, sparse attendance, equipment issues, high prices, and other embarassments.
As it happens, President Trump has some historical company. 100 years ago, in Philadelphia, dicey politicians hoped to replicate the success of the 1876 Centennial Exposition with a celebration of America’s 150th birthday. Instead, the 1926 “world’s fair” lost millions of dollars, hobbling the city’s finances on the eve of the Great Depression. Meilan Solly reports…
A century ago, the first visitors to Philadelphia’s Sesquicentennial International Exposition—held to mark the 150th anniversary of the United States’ founding—waded through mud and wandered along unpaved sidewalks to reach the heart of the fairgrounds, only to find carpenters still at work on half-finished exhibition halls and gaping holes marking the spots where attractions had yet to be built.
Dining and shopping options were limited, and some of the few exhibits on view stretched the very definition of “entertainment.” One was a model Post Office where “you could go send yourself a letter and watch it get canceled,” says historian Thomas H. Keels, author of Sesqui! Greed, Graft and the Forgotten World’s Fair of 1926. “That was it.”
The 200,000-plus Shriners in town for their fraternal organization’s national convention realized that their parades and rallies were the main events planned for these early days of the fair. Many went home disappointed, telling family and friends that the exposition wasn’t worth visiting…
Held in Philadelphia between May 31 and December 31, 1926, the fair—referred to as the Sesqui—celebrated the 150th anniversary of the United States’ founding. Little remembered today, the event was a financial failure that Varietydeemed “America’s greatest flop.” Exact figures are hard to come by, but Keels suggests that the fair lost the equivalent of more than $410 million in today’s dollars, effectively bankrupting the city of Philadelphia.
The exposition was America’s main celebration of the sesquicentennial. Congress authorized the fair and provided limited funding for it, in addition to issuing commemorative coins and encouraging local celebrations, but the scale of federal participation paled in comparison with that of the 1976 bicentennial and this year’s 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Attendance at the Sesquicentennial Exposition also failed to match the numbers of Philadelphia’s 1876 centennial celebration, which attracted roughly 20 percent of the country’s population in an era when planes, cars and luxury liners had yet to make long-distance travel more accessible. Organizers predicted that 30 million people would visit the 1926 fair; ultimately, fewer than five million paid to attend. [For comparison, more than 44 million people visited the “World of Tomorrow” at the 1939-40 New York World’s Fair. Two and a half decades later, 51 million visitors flocked to the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair.]
What doomed the sesquicentennial? Poor planning and lukewarm reviews by the fair’s early visitors contributed to the disastrous outcome. So, too, did the streak of bad weather that plagued Philadelphia during the exposition’s run, with rain falling on more than half of the days the fair was open to the public.
Although some observers considered the lackluster public response a sign that the golden age of world’s fairs had come to an end, Chicago’s 1933-34 Century of Progress Exposition proved this prediction wrong, drawing more visitors than any of its predecessors. Overall, Keels attributes the 1926 fair’s failure to its “association with what was being viewed as an increasingly corrupt political machine,” headed by Pennsylvania Republican William Scott Vare.
After the fair incurred “nationwide ridicule,” Keels tells Smithsonian magazine, Vare and other local politicians were eager to move on from the endeavor, selling off leftover structures piecemeal “for pennies on the hundreds of dollars.” This push to forget the sesquicentennial has reverberated into the present: Just one building constructed for the 1926 fair stands in Philadelphia today…
More of the macabre story: “America’s 150th Birthday Celebration Was Deemed the Nation’s ‘Greatest Flop.’ What Went Wrong With the Sesquicentennial?” from @smithsonianmag.bsky.social.
Apposite: “America Is Trapped in the Grossest Pool Party of All Time.”
* John Steinbeck
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As we rethink recreation, we might celebrate one of the great “public parties” of all time, recalling that it was on this date in 1970 that the Second Atlanta International Pop Festival opened in a soybean field adjacent to the Middle Georgia Raceway in Byron, Georgia. Running officially through the 5th (but actually ending around dawn on the 6th), 500-600,000 folks attended a festival designed to foster a sense of community that transcended race, region, and social class. And while the weather was boiling (local farmers brought watermelons and cantaloupes to help attendees), and there were reports of occasional nudity and recreational drug use, the three days were essentially trouble free… and a blast.
Performers included The Allman Brothers Band, the Chambers Brothers, Richie Havens, Grand Funk Railroad, It’s a Beautiful Day, B.B. King, Lee Michaels, Mott the Hoople, Mountain, Poco, Procol Harum, Rare Earth, John Sebastian, the Bob Seger System, Spirit, Ten Years After, Johnny Winter– and the Jimi Hendrix Experience who, at midnight on this date in 1970, played his rendition of the “Star-Spangled Banner” for nearly 500,000 people—the largest crowd of Hendrix’s career.
Georgia’s “colorful” governor at the time, Lester Maddox, who had tried repeatedly to prevent the festival from taking place, vowed that he would do whatever it took to block any similar event in the future. The state legislature willingly complied and enacted sufficient restrictions to make it much more difficult for anyone to organize another rock festival in the state. A third Atlanta Pop Festival never took place.
Georgia’s loss. As “Abraham Lincoln” said (in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure), “Be excellent to each other. And… PARTY ON, DUDES!”
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