Arnon Grunberg's Blog, page 10

Beginnings

University

On privacy – Cordelia Fine in TLS:

‘One evening in 2018, Robert Ivinson, a first-year philosophy student at the University of Exeter, was alone in his designated room in halls of residence, talking on the phone with a friend. Despite the door and windows being closed, his conversation was overheard by another student. Later that night, he was visited by two men from campus night patrol. “It was like the Stasi had come to my door”, he told a journalist. One stuck his boot in the door; “you’ve been saying some very offensive things in here”, he said. Ivinson was formally disciplined by the university and questioned over comments made privately to his friend that veganism is wrong and gender fluidity is stupid. The university declared him guilty of harassment, warning that any further breaches of university rules would result in expulsion.
When the episode came to light last year, Edward Skidelsky, a lecturer in philosophy at Exeter and director of the Committee for Academic Freedom, remarked how “extraordinary” it was “that in 21st-century Britain eavesdroppers can be rewarded, and a student punished for remarks made to a friend in the privacy of his room”.’

(…)

‘As a concept, privacy had inauspicious beginnings. The word comes from the Latin privatus, referring to “deprivation” of public office. For the ancient Athenians, nothing important happened in private – hence the importance of keeping the public and private spheres strictly segregated. In contrast, in medieval Europe, there was no clear delineation between the two, and the very notion of a private life free from scrutiny and judgement by authorities or community was considered suspect for centuries. “The murderer and the adulterer are alike desirous of privacy”, admonished one seventeenth-century English preacher.’

(…)

‘This opened the door to other unauthorized interpretations of God’s will. About a century and a half later, John Locke’s Letter on Toleration, published in 1689, suggested religious tolerance (for some, at least) as an alternative to violent suppression. Arguing that the state must respect its citizens as rational subjects, Locke laid the intellectual foundations for the now taken-for-granted belief in people’s “capacity to lead what we now regard as complete private lives”, Jenkins writes, “in which they can autonomously determine how to worship and conduct themselves”.’

(…)

‘In 1859, John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty asserted that the freedom that should serve as a foundational principle of social organization requires a clearly delineated private realm. “There is a circle around every human being which no government, be it that of one, or a few, or of the many, ought to be permitted to overstep”, Mill wrote. Private life, a place undisturbed by public attention, offered a space for individuals to experiment with ideas and ways of life, free from the crushing “tyranny” of majority opinion.
British law at the time was establishing limits to such private “experimentation” in the form of a husband’s physical abuse of his wife and children.In the US, however, privacy was still a trump card even in this regard. In 1868, the Supreme Court of North Carolina determined that, although state law did not recognize a husbandly right to whip his wife, it was not a criminal offence. The view of the presiding justice was that “[t]he costs of invading a married couple’s privacy were … greater than the damage wreaked by beating a spouse”.’

(…)

‘The argument, in other words, is that many cultural, economic, political and social factors were conditioning us decades before the young Mark Zuckerberg, as a Harvard computer science student, was inspired to create a website that enabled normally private judgements as to which fellow students someone found “hot or not” to be made public. He faced charges (all eventually dropped) of breaching security, copyright infringement and violating individual privacy. That none of this quite captures what some might find repellent about the website resonates with the author’s critique of a denuded concept of privacy that is “now more about agreeing to terms of service … than the right to be left alone”.’(…)

‘We are in a state of “deep confusion” about private life, the author argues, and the stakes are high. All of us, she says – celebrities, politicians, members of the royal family, even scumbags and bigots – need access to what the sociologist Erving Goffman referred to as the backstage areas of life. Here, thank goodness, we can take off the masks we wear in public, collect and restore ourselves, and think through feelings and beliefs in a safe space.’

(…)

‘For anyone who sometimes has unthinkable thoughts or says the unsayable – which is to say everyone – Strangers and Intimates is a magisterial intellectual history of an important and evolving concept, a reminder to cherish the handful of friends and family with whom we can be mask-free, and a timely and compelling call to rebuild the fortress and replate the shield that protects our private life.’

Read the article here.

I don’t think that we can be ever mask-free, but the backstage areas of life should exist and should be protected.

To some people, these areas are the most frightening areas.

What if nobody is watching? That’s hell.

Generous

Casualties

On casualties – The Economist:

‘As of July 9th our tracker suggests there have been between 900,000 and 1.3m Russian casualties since the war began, including some 190,000–350,000 deaths. That updates assessments from other sources, which put total casualties above 1mat the end of June. Our numbers suggest roughly 31,000 Russians may have been killed in the summer offensive so far, which began in earnest on May 1st.’

(…)

‘Even at the quicker pace of the past 30 days, it would take another 89 years to conquer all of Ukraine. Seizing the unoccupied parts of the four regions that Mr Putin already claims—Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia—would take until February 2029.
Yet Mr Putin seems undeterred. His armed forces are recruiting 10,000-15,000 more troops per month than Ukraine’s are, luring Russians with generous sign-on bonuses and salaries rather than relying on the conscription now roiling Ukraine.
On July 7th Donald Trump announced that America will resume sending weapons to Ukraine.’

Read the article here.

Another 89 years. Fair enough.

As to the Ukrainian casualties, here’s a recent article in The Guardian:

‘Ukraine has suffered very high losses as well, with between 60,000 and 100,000 personnel killed and total casualties reaching approximately 400,000.’

Read it here.

Ukraine is trying to spread its casualties among all age groups to prevent even lower birth rates.

No peace in Ukraine, no peace in Gaza, but the Nobel Peace Prize is coming to Mr. T.

Netanyahu has recommended POTUS already to the committee. As has been said, whether Bibi’s recommendation will be taken seriously is open to debate.

Difference

Reminder

On a pointless war once again – Amos Harel in Haaretz:

‘A few hours before U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu began their first of two planned meetings at the White House on Monday, five soldiers were killed and 14 wounded by explosions in the northern Gaza Strip.
The explosions, near the ruins of the town of Khan Yunis, was yet another reminder of how deeply Israel is mired in a pointless war that it has long since lost any justification for continuing. "You were a brave soldier in a war with no goal," said a friend of one of the dead, Sgt. 1st Class Benyamin Asulin of Haifa, in his eulogy.’

(…)

‘What is going on between Trump and Netanyahu is still not known. On Wednesday morning, the two met for a second time in a day and on short notice. A so-called senior political official who on Tuesday briefed Israeli journalists said there was no difference in the U.S. and Israeli views on the Gaza cease-fire talks. What is important to each side was also clear from the brief dialogue recorded by the cameras.
Trump, who is not the slightest bit embarrassed by any act of flattery, was pleased by Netanyahu's announcement that he had proposed the president as a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize. (Trump should perhaps ask himself whether Netanyahu's nomination helps or hurts his chances.) Netanyahu resumed talk about "voluntary migration" of Gazans – a euphemism for the planned violent, forced expulsion of the Strip's Palestinian population.
This plan rears its ugly head about once every two months, mainly during Netanyahu's visits to Washington. Trump, who expressed support for the idea in February, seems to have lost interest since then. The extensive preoccupation of the prime minister and his people with it may have nothing to do with strategic or even coalition considerations (the attempt to keep the far-right factions in the government). Perhaps it is meant to be a deal-killer that can be pulled out of his hat if Hamas proves to be flexible in the cease-fire negotiations.’(…)
‘Now, in the negotiations, Israel is struggling over the future of the aid fund, over which many questions surround its ties to businessmen and possibly politicians. Meanwhile, the one taking fire is IDF Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir. He has become a source of concern for Netanyahu, Katz, and others due to his reservations about concentrating the Gazans in Rafah. The leaks against him are part of a deliberate attempt to intimidate him, with the aim of restraining him and getting him to toe the line.’

Read the article here.

It’s Trump that can stop Netanyahu. If he is willing to do that? Maybe in return for the Nobel?

The both selfish and messianic destruction that is the center of Netanyahu’s program appears to be endless, anybody who is opposing this policy, even if it’s the IDF Chief of Staff ,needs to be whipped into obedience.

Pens

Trash

On the chief - Harper's:

‘From a complaint filed in March by a North Bergen, New Jersey, lieutenant against the department’s chief.
On multiple occasions, the chief has exited the bathroom in his office and exposed himself to others in the room, making inappropriate comments such as, “Hey, look, it’s bigger than you thought, right?” The chief has pulled his pants down and defecated on the floor in front of his entire staff. During a cleanup of his former office, the chief defecated in a trash can. Only after persistent urging did the chief eventually agree to clean it up days later. He also deliberately damaged officers’ personal property by breaking pens and smearing ink on uniforms, vehicle door handles, and office equipment, leaving officers with ruined clothes and ink-stained faces.’

(…)

‘The chief also tampered with office coffee by adding prescription medications such as Adderall and Viagra, causing staff to experience the effects without their consent. In one incident, he poisoned a corporal’s fish, causing all of them to die.’

Read the article here.

Speaking of toxic relationships.

Adding Viagra to other’s people’s coffee without their consent?The not-so-self-medication.

Humans always manage to surprise us, much more than other animals.

Agreement

Praise

On diplomacy – Lulu Garcia-Navarro interviewing Mark Rutte in NYT:

‘But the biggest headlines out of the summit were actually about Rutte’s relationship with Trump. Before the summit, Trump posted on Truth Social a highly complimentary private text message that Rutte sent him about the American bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities. And then, during the meeting, Rutte joked that Trump acted as a “daddy” to misbehaving Middle Eastern nations, which Trump clearly loved — Trump’s fund-raising committee even started selling “Daddy” T-shirts.’

(…)

‘Before we get into that substance, I’d like to talk a little bit about style, because your interactions with President Trump in the aftermath of that meeting have been called, and I’m quoting here, “fawning” and “an orchestrated grovel.” I saw someone refer to NATO now as the North Atlantic Trump Organization. How do you see it? I think when somebody deserves praise, that praise should be given. And President Trump deserves all the praise, because without his leadership, without him being re-elected president of the United States, the 2 percent this year and the 5 percent in 2035 — we would never, ever, ever have been able to achieve agreement on this.’

(…)

‘All right. We are meeting after this NATO summit, and the big success is that the member nations — except for Spain — agreed to increase their defense spending to 5 percent of their G.D.P. by 2035. Can you briefly talk me through why 5 percent is the right number? Yeah, and by the way, all 32 agreed. There’s one issue with Spain. Spain is saying, OK, we agree, but we think we can reach all those capabilities with a lower investment. That is absolutely impossible, so history will prove them wrong. But that’s an agreement to disagree.
But to your question: We have an enormous geopolitical challenge on our hands. And that is first of all Russia, which is reconstituting itself at a pace and a speed which is unparalleled in recent history. They are now producing three times as much ammunition in three months as the whole of NATO is doing in a year. This is unsustainable, but the Russians are working together with the North Koreans, with the Chinese and Iranians, the mullahs, in fighting this unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine. So here, the Indo-Pacific and your Atlantic are getting more and more interconnected. We know that China has its eye on Taiwan. Given this whole geopolitical setup, there is no way we can defend ourselves if we stick to this old 2 percent.
So when it comes to core defense spending, we have to move up to 3.5 percent. And then of course there is all the defense-related spending. We need to develop the defense industrial base. We need to spend money on cyber, on hybrid. We need to prepare our societies at large beyond the military. That’s the extra 1.5 percent leading into the 5 percent. So, yes, this is an enormous amount of spending. But if we don’t, we’ll have to learn Russian.’

(…)

‘You think that Europe’s going to have to do conscription? No, no, that’s up to the individual countries to decide. Some countries will do it. Finland already has conscription. Others will not do it, but it will mean in general paying good salaries for our men and women in uniform. What I’m particularly worried about is the defense industrial output, and this is a problem across the alliance, because we simply lack the defense industrial base to produce the weapons we need to make sure that we can deter the Russians or the North Koreans or whoever to attack us. And this we are working on very quickly now.’

(…)

‘Secretary General, what I’m asking here is: You say that the commitment is ironclad, and yet what we are seeing, while a war is raging with a resurgent Russia on Europe’s doorstep, is the United States pulling back from Europe. I really have to correct you. The United States is not pulling away from Europe. What the United States expects the Europeans to do is to take care of their own defense at a larger scale than we do currently, which is only logical. Let me assure you that all the plans we have, part of those plans is that Europeans gradually — and this is a shift — take more of the burden for the defense of this part of NATO territory from the U.S., so that the U.S. can therefore pivot more toward Asia, toward the Indo-Pacific, as the U.S. should. This is also in our European interest, because we know that China and North Korea are very much involved in this war effort in Ukraine. So this is all interconnected.’

(…)

‘When I was preparing for this interview, obviously I read a lot about you. One thing that really struck me was that while you were prime minister of the Netherlands, you advocated withholding pandemic funds from countries that weren’t adhering to E.U. democratic values — that countries that weren’t acting in a democratic fashion shouldn’t be the beneficiary of money coming from the E.U. Which was a broadly held view in Europe.
It made me wonder: Do you think countries that aren’t credible democracies should be part of NATO? Well, I’m now leading this alliance of 32 countries. And that means that I have only one job, and that’s making sure that the whole alliance stays together, that we stay on one page. And that means that the last thing I’m going to do is discuss national politics.
But part of the idea of NATO is about allies who share a commitment to democratic values. It was created for that. And now you have as part of this alliance what some would call a democratically backsliding United States. You have Hungary, which calls itself an illiberal democracy. And you have Turkey under President Erdogan, which has been called an electoral autocracy. Can this alliance hold when the very values at its heart are no longer commonly held in the way that perhaps they once had been? I’m not sure I would completely subscribe to all the assumptions in your question, but that is a debate, as democracies, that we can have, and that is why we are indeed an alliance of democracies. I can tell you that in NATO, you will have many debates and issues between countries. There are debates on values, on everything. That’s exactly why this alliance is so alive and so strong, because we sometimes have these tough issues. We fight them out, and then we come together and agree. And at this moment, I can only tell you that this alliance of 32 countries is stronger and more united than ever in recent history. I cannot in my role debate the pluses and minuses of what is happening in each of the 32 countries.’

(…)

‘It’s this overarching question about what is the alliance really about and if these 32 members are still united by a common vision. And they are, and we are.
So it doesn’t concern you that Trump has also talked about annexing Canada, for example, also a NATO member? When I’m not commenting about discussions between individual allies, of course I will not comment on that. No, I can’t. That’s not my role.’

(…)

‘So you think NATO will last with America at its heart? Absolutely. I have no doubt of America being the leader in the world and also within NATO, with the Europeans taking their fair share in terms of the burden, and that’s only good. That makes NATO stronger and fairer and more lethal — exactly as we should be.’

Read the interview here.

A quick course in diplomacy.

The US invading Canada? NATO would like to stay out of it. But NATO will survive, maybe without Canada.

Sacrifice Canada. It’s a relatively small sacrifice after all.

Maybe, Mr. Rutte is an excellent Trump whisperer. Future historians will let us know.

Rats

Eating

On a cease-fire – Liza Rozovsky in Haaretz:

‘This means that to the extent that things depend on Israel, the current cease-fire is a rerun of its predecessor, which came into effect in January: a 60-day pause, maybe a bit longer, followed by renewed attacks and fighting on the pretext that Hamas is unwilling to disarm and completely relinquish control of Gaza.
The section in the draft agreement that tortuously guarantees that Trump and the U.S. are committed to efforts to ensure that "genuine negotiations" or "good faith negotiations" continue until a final agreement is reached leaves Netanyahu with the long-awaited opening to do so.
Hence, his demand that the army draw up a plan for widespread expulsions to the southern Gaza Strip, this time from Gaza City and the central refugee camps, where hundreds of thousands of Gazans live in post-apocalyptic conditions in destroyed and burned-out buildings, and where bags of rice or flour mixed with lentil powder are suspended on ropes to prevent rats eating them.’

(…)

‘Recent remarks by U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack, who now also serves as Trump's envoy for Syria and Lebanese affairs, indicate that Trump's aides include numerous critics of Israel. He told The New York Times that the cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon was a "total failure," because Israel continues to bomb Lebanon and Hezbollah continues to violate the cease-fire's terms.’

(…)

‘However, at this rate, realizing Trump's vision of expanding the Abraham Accords appears to be a distant, if not unachievable, goal. The big question is how long the U.S. president is willing to wait for the Israeli prime minister on Syria, Lebanon and especially Gaza, after coming to his aid to bomb Iran's nuclear installations.’

Read the article here.

In other words, more of the same.
When is Trump losing his patience with Bibi?

Will a new cease-fire be another failure?

Yesterday somebody told me, ‘it’s hard to be an optimist without being naïve.’

And it’s easier to live with catastrophes when the catastrophe doesn’t take place in your neighborhood.

Term

Economy

On the damage – The Economist:

‘And as we report, the One Big Beautiful Bill act (bbb) that passed the Senate on July 1st and the House on July 3rd looks more like traditional tax-cutting, spending-slashing Republicanism worthy of Paul Ryan or Mitt Romney than it does a maga fantasy. Suddenly, business leaders are again willing to see Mr Trump as the populist from his first term: a man to be taken seriously but not literally.
Unfortunately, the bbb, which Mr Trump plans to sign into law on July 4th, is likely to cast a shadow over this sunny picture. It illustrates the long-term damage Mr Trump is doing to the foundations of America’s economy.’

(…)

‘The bbb’s neglect of the long term is part of a wider malaise. Riding high on America’s economic might and undoubted negotiating leverage, Mr Trump ignores the foundations of America’s success. He has renewed his attacks on the Fed, adding another threat to economic stability. His defunding of scientific research will harm American innovation. His cavalier approach to the rule of law makes America a riskier place to invest. And despite the moderation of his trade war, the average tariff rate is still its highest in a century and trade-policy uncertainty is a burden. Even as American assets boom in dollar terms, they have fallen behind when priced in foreign currencies. An 11% fall in the dollar this year reflects long-term risks to the American economy that are real, and growing.’

Read the article here.

Après nous, la deluge.

Let them have cake? No, no, the empire is eating its own citizens. The uninsured, the have-nots.

Leverage

Government

On a new regional order – Amos Harel in Haaretz:

‘For the first time in a long while, the direction of things is clear and intentions are no longer obscured by contradictory declarations. U.S. President Donald Trump is aiming to leverage what he describes as the great victory over Iran to impose a new regional order in the Middle East.’

(…)

‘The far-right elements in his government also smell danger. After clashing with Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Eyal Zamir earlier this week over the objectives in the Gaza war, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called on his colleague, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, to forge a united front to thwart the deal.
In contrast, the public sentiment in Israel is in a different direction. Even after a slight rise in Netanyahu's popularity after the Iran offensive and the resulting cease-fire, all the polls consistently indicate that a strong majority of the Israeli public support ending the war and securing the hostages' release – even at a steep cost. Against this backdrop, both opposition leader Yair Lapid and MK Benny Gantz have offered the government a safety net in Knesset voting to ensure that the deal passes.’

(…)

‘Behind the scenes, Trump is dangling more bait for Netanyahu: the possibility of extending the Abraham Accords to more countries. Reports about secret talks between Israel and Syria have emerged in recent days. Extensive coordination is indeed taking place behind the scenes, which could help the new regime in Damascus reduce the territory that Israel captured from it last December.
Even so, it's hard to see how Israeli-Syrian relations can occur without Israel's readiness to return all the territory it captured in the Golan Heights – a demand every Syrian president since 1967 has insisted on and one Israel rejects outright.
In the longer term, Trump aspires to reshape the region under American influence, and to bring about Saudi-Israeli normalization. Such achievements would also ensure another of his major goals: winning the Nobel Peace Prize already this year.’

(…)

‘Trump's less friendly side was experienced by Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whom the American leader never liked from the beginning. Zelenskyy did everything Trump told him to, including signing a generous agreement to transfer natural resources to the United States. Nevertheless, Washington is now holding up a shipment of vital defensive systems, thus leaving the Ukrainians vulnerable to missile and drone attacks from Russia.
Who knows – maybe there's a quiet lesson hiding here for Israel, too.’

(…)

‘Zamir told the cabinet and the security cabinet on several occasions that Hamas is beaten, under siege, and wants to end the war. From his perspective, the war in Iran also improved the situation in the Palestinian arena, because the regime in Tehran will be hard-pressed to support Hamas directly anytime in the near future. Additionally, the close ties between the United States and Qatar (which helped bring about the cease-fire with Iran) could spur the Qataris to get results with Hamas as well.
Throughout Operation Gideon's Chariots – the present, deeply controversial, campaign in the Gaza Strip – Zamir often clashed with the far-right ministers resisting actions he believes would endanger the hostages. In one meeting, Ben-Gvir accused him of being ready to sacrifice lives of soldiers and civilians only to save the lives of ten captives (even though there are actually 20 living captives).’

(…)

‘The confrontation between the sides became vociferous, and Zamir hurled at Smotrich: "Tell the truth – you gave up on the hostages."’

Read the article here.

Smotrich is not the only one who gave up on the hostages.

Also, Trump is in such a hurry to get the Nobel Peace Prize that he is willing to sacrifice Ukraine.

But Trump has leverage, the only one who has that and who is capable of steering Netanyahu in his direction.

The powerlessness of the EU is partly also lack of real interest. As long as the refugees don’t disturb the EU too much, bloodshed on the Balkan, in Africa, in the Middle East is deemed acceptable.

Stopover

Map

On the clientele – Annie Armstrong in NYT:

‘Once a stopover for starving artists and gin-blossomed locals, Fanelli Cafe in Manhattan has become the choice meeting place for micro-celebrities brandishing hot dogs and Miista-heeled shoppers craving mid-spree martinis. In its 178 years on the corner of Mercer Street and Prince Street, the SoHo standby has never been hotter. The diners there, however, are more like a 4.1 out of 10.
At least, according to a GeoCities-esque website called LooksMapping.
LooksMapping is a digital heat map that claims to show “which restaurants have the most attractive diners — according to AI.”’

(…)

‘LooksMapping was created by Riley Walz, a 22-year-old programmer in San Francisco with a penchant for using Google review data to make sardonic observations about the restaurant industry. Mr. Walz was also one of three people behind Mehran’s Steak House, a fake restaurant with a near-perfect Google rating that opened for one night in 2023.
To create LooksMapping, Mr. Walz left his laptop open over a weekend as an A.I. model scraped 2.8 million Google reviews. From 1.5 million unique accounts, it identified 587,000 profile images with distinguishable faces. Mr. Walz then prompted the model to extrapolate whether those pictured were young or old, male or female, and, to put it in vintage internet terms, hot or not.’

(…)

‘Proximity makes little difference: Kiki’s, the perpetually overflowing Greek restaurant in Manhattan’s Chinatown, scored an 8.2, but its neighbor Bacaro, a slightly more upscale Italian restaurant that attracts virtually the same clientele, scored a 3.7.’

(…)

‘Back at Fanelli Cafe, a recent trip to more accurately gauge the 4-rated crowd found no off-duty models. But good manners (and good sense) would stop most onlookers short of calling anyone ugly.
“Actually, that score makes sense to me,” said Jasmine Baker, 24, a server there. “Eighty percent of our clientele are tourists, so they may not be ‘New York hot.’”’

Read the article here.

My favorite restaurants were either not listed or got lousy ratings, but alas.

I always thought that the service was more important than the food, but clientele trumps service.

It’s the clientele stupid.

Industry

Border

On a warm surf – Antje Blinda, Simon Book, Claus Hecking, Eva Lehnen, Martin U. Müller, Thilo Neumann, Julia Stanek and Gerald Traufetter in Der Spiegel:

‘Sometimes, just 20 minutes lie between a dream vacation and a horrific travel experience. It’s early May in Seattle – in the far northwestern corner of the U.S. Birgit and Martin Kreil, both from Vienna, are experienced travelers to the U.S., with the couple having made the trip around half a dozen times. They have family in Seattle, which is why they regularly fly the 11 hours across the Atlantic. Never before have they encountered any problems.
But this time, it’s different. This time, as they are standing before the border control officials, the procedure appears to have changed. The officers flip through their passports before consulting with their colleagues. Then comes the command: "Follow me.” They are led to a neon-lit room with a handful of chairs and forced to relinquish their mobile phones. Nobody tells them why or gives them any kind of explanation as to why they have been pulled aside, says Birgit Keil, 45. They are left completely alone and began growing concerned. "I thought that was it and that we would be placed on the next flight back,” says Martin Kreil, 46.
Their ordeal ends after 20 minutes, though it seems far longer to the Kreils. The officials wordlessly return their passports and mobile phones and gesture to the door. They are allowed to enter the country to attend Birgit’s family reunion in addition to a flight to Hawaii to celebrate her father’s 85th birthday. But they are left with a bad taste in their mouths. "Arbitrary,” she says. "Banana republic,” he says.’

(…)

‘Instead of the 9 percent increase in international arrivals to the U.S. that had been predicted, tourism authorities are now saying that 2025 will see a 10 percent drop in arrivals – a gap of almost 20 percentage points. According to Oxford Economics, the United States is the only one of the 184 economies analyzed that is predicted to see a decline in spending by international visitors in 2025.’

(…)

‘European interest in traveling to the U.S. is also dropping. New York now believes the number of international guests visiting the city will be 17 percent lower than forecasts earlier in the year. Denmark and Finland have issued travel warnings for transgender travelers. Germany’s government has at least updated its travel advisories for the U.S. to note that "false information about the purpose of stay or even a slight overstay” may lead to "arrest, detention and deportation.” From the beginning of the year to the end of May, the number of Germans flying to the U.S. dropped by almost 8 percent relative to the same period a year earlier. In the Netherlands, the drop was 11 percent, and it was 6.5 percent for both Belgium and Norway.’

(…)

‘For last minute travelers, to be sure, that is good news: Tickets to America can be had for cheaper than they have been for years.’

(…)

‘The fear and unease in the travel industry, though, is vast. Many are concerned that the malcontent could manifest itself for years to come and that the wealthy and important clientele from overseas will stay away for several years, preferring instead to explore other countries as well. And that they will learn that other countries, too, serve tasty cocktails on breathtaking natural beaches with warm surf.’

(…)

‘More than 3 million visitors come to Alaska in a normal season, bringing in $3.9 billion and providing 48,000 jobs. Tourism was recently on the verge of displacing the state’s fishery as the second-most important sector of the economy, right behind the oil and natural gas industry.
Now, the slowing stream of visitors is even making itself felt in the elegant Candlewood Suites. Hotel manager Lloyd Huskey, in his mid-60s, points to a table on his computer screen showing that his hotel has only been 66 percent full since the beginning of the year on average. In 2024, it was 87 percent at this point in the year. And because management has cut rates, turnover has taken a hit, with the hotel bringing in only $1.5 million instead of the normal $2.5 million. Hardly surprising, says Huskey: "No one feels safe to travel.”’

(…)

‘In an attempt to address the problem, Presutti and Coker recently traveled to Washington, D.C., with their counterparts from a number of large American cities to meet with lawmakers and cabinet members to lobby for policy changes and, especially, a change in tone. To no avail. "I was shocked,” says Presutti, "how little attention most people in Washington pay to tourism. How little they know about how important our industry is.”’

(…)

‘In 1982, Austrian pop star Udo Jürgens released the anthem to go along with the phenomenon: "Ich war noch niemals in New York” – "I’ve never been to New York.” The U.S. became a place where many young Germans went to study abroad, to work as au pairs, for internships or even to study at university. Later, they wanted to take their children to the U.S. to share their experiences – and booked summer vacations in the States.
It was a time when tourists weren’t just extremely welcome in the U.S., but the country also believed they could serve a greater good. In order to spread the American worldview across the globe, it was helpful to have an army of people who had visited the country. Around the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the U.S. even eliminated the visa requirement for German travelers – so that all those from former East Germany could also visit Manhattan and the Golden Gate Bridge.’

(…)

‘The constant mantra of "higher, faster, farther” was always a source of fascination for the Germans, as was unbridled capitalism, the striving for one’s own happiness. Is that fascination now transforming into repulsion because the situation has become so grotesque, the abuses all too obvious? And not just since this president’s election?Schubert can only give his friends a glimmer of hope. "For Europeans, a trip to Hawaii is an absolute dream vacation. For most, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience,” he says. "All the stars have to be perfectly alligned.”’

Read the article here.

Stock market is up, who cares about tourism?

And since everything can change suddenly, maybe suddenly the president will start to care about tourism.

It’s also possible that higher, faster farther lost its attraction.

But I don’t see an end to Anglo-Saxon cultural imperialism, the elites, especially the young elites very much want to take part in the lingua franca, and everything that is associated with it.
The moment I will start writing on this site in German, Chinese, or Spanish, you know that the winds of change are blowing too hard.

The voluntary submission to American culture, not only a European thing, but very much a European thing, will live longer than Trump. And this submission goes hand in hand with outburst of anti-Americanism.

You love your parent, you hate your parent, even when the parent is not a parent anymore.