Atlantic Monthly Contributors's Blog, page 1081

Dartmouth President on Rape Threats: Campus Is Like a 'Pressure Cooker'

[image error]When asked to explain why Dartmouth had to cancel a full day of class this week after threats based on rape, race, and sexual orientation, the university's interim president accidentally likened the state of the Ivy League school to the Boston bombers' weapon of choice. Thing is, apologizing for her ill-timed euphemism might be the least of Carol Folt's problems.

Here's that unfortunate quote, from today's New Hampshire Union Leader:

Speaking to students, Folt likened the campus climate to a "pressure cooker very close to exploding."

It's not quite the CNN reporter who said, on air, that the eerie quiet of Boston in lockdown seemed "as if a bomb had gone off," but Folt probably could have gone with a different euphemism—even "kettle" is in the kitchen appliance category.

But let's not mince the words of Dartmouth's top administrator, even though they came on a retreat day meant for reconciliation, "community gathering," and calm words, not more provocation. Folt was addressing the school's decision to cancel Wednesday classes after students protested university officials' current stance toward sexual assault, racism, and homophobia on campus—or its lack of one. The left-leaning Think Progress has a good recap of Dartmouth's difficult history with race, which stretches way back to students. And in terms of sexual assault, which students have protesting loudly this year, Rolling Stone's Janet Reitman reported last March that there may be a serious case of under-reporting at Dartmouth:

Between 2008 and 2010, according to the college's official statistics, Dartmouth averaged about 15 reports of sexual assault each year among its 6,000 students. Brown, a school with 8,500 students, averaged eight assaults; Harvard, with 21,000 students, had 21. And those numbers are likely just a fraction of the actual count: One study showed that 95 percent of all sexual assaults among college students are never reported. In 2006, Dartmouth's Sexual Abuse Awareness Program estimated that there were actually 109 incidents on campus.

It appears that Dartmouth has more reported sexual assaults than expected for a school of its size and a severe case of under-reporting—a combination that suggests the school isn't an ideal place for victims (and alleged victims) to speak out. Here's what isn't helping: The past week saw an outpouring of animosity, especially on social media, aimed at students who protested the Dartmouth "problem" with sexual assaults, homophobia and racism. It all started getting really bad on April 19—a visiting day for prospective students. The blog Real Talk Dartmouth has a compilation of messages from campus discussion boards, Facebook, and Twitter:

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As hate speech piled on throughout the week, Folt and university officials canceled classes for a day, opting instead for "teach-ins" and a speech by a "social justice and diversity consultant." Folt is only serving as Dartmouth's president until June. But she won't be able to run away from this campus rape problem. You see, she's been elected as the next chancellor at the University of North Carolina in Chapel hill, where the university is currently the subject of a federal investigation into whether or not the school, among other things, told an alleged sexual assault victim that rape was like a "football game"—and told another that she was being "lazy" after she came forward about her attack. Hopefully Folt will have dropped the pressure cooker analogies by then. 

       

'Pain & Gain': Michael Bay's Gross, Engrossing World

Just as he watched Titanic and then decided to make Pearl Harbor, glam-schlock purveyor Michael Bay must have been watching Fargo when he decided to make his latest film Pain & Gain. Like the Coen Brothers' 1996 masterpiece, Pain & Gain is about small-time crooks whose dumb plans go hideously awry. There's a despairing humor to the whole mess, but of course there's also a darkness, the insidious creep of the abyss gnawing at the film's edges. But that, I'm afraid, is where the similarities end. For while Fargo and its indie crime movie ilk tend to prefer simple aesthetics and careful wording, Pain & Gain goes for gusto and rumble; it's in some ways the ugliest movie Bay has made, though I must admit that despite all the appalling brashness, there are hints of a halfway decent film glinting in the glaring Miami sun.

Pain & Gain is based on the real-life story of the Sun Gym Gang, a group of muscle-head roid-ragers led by a body-building conman named Chris Lugo (here played by Mark Wahlberg). Between 1994 and 1995, Lugo and two pals Paul and Adrian (Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Anthony Mackie) kidnapped one of Lugo's wealthy gym clients, tortured him until he signed over all his money, and then tried to kill him in elaborate fashion. It didn't work, but when they tried the scheme again on a new mark, things took a gruesomer turn. Puffed-up and comically inept and overambitious, these guys were trying to take the fast lane to the good life and wound up destroying theirs and many others'. Bay and his screenwriters, adapting from a series of articles from The Miami New Times, see this as a decidedly American story, something about men of action doing something to get ahead in this world, stupidly, terribly, and monstrously as they might have done it. It's hard to tell whether Pain & Gain is giving us heroes, antiheroes, villains, or what. The things they do are certainly awful, but this is largely a kinetic, brightly hued comedy, and Bay films his leads, especially Wahlberg, with his usual loving slo-mo grandeur, his camera low and looking up as if at God or the David. So its morality is muddled, but that's not Pain & Gain's greatest sin.

Michael Bay is mostly disgusting. Can I say that? Is that unprofessional? For one thing, he's a horrible misogynist. Every woman in this film is solely contextualized by her body, whether they're titted-up and slinky like the dumb Romanian stripper (Bar Paly, poor thing) who gets involved in the caper, or they're Rebel Wilson, playing the love interest of Mackie's character, who likes "big girls." The word "bitch" is thrown around as frequently as Mr. Tarantino's N-word, and Bay has his gals wearing dark eyeliner and bubblegum pink lipstick even while working out hard at the gym. (He has a particularly juvenile sexual ideal, all pouty and perky but with dark eye makeup that suggests they're also dirty girls, for the right man of course. It's Tea Leoni in Bad Boys, it's Vanessa Marcil in The Rock, it's Megan Fox in Transformers, and it's Paly here. He couldn't really do that with Kate Beckinsale in Pearl Harbor, because that was his serious movie, but look! There are hints.) His women have no value, what little agency they have only afforded to them by their bodies. And he's blithe about it! He really doesn't care that people have been criticizing him about this for years. Once a Victoria's Secret commercial director, always a Victoria's Secret commercial director, I guess.

There's a healthy level of gay panic humor running throughout Pain & Gain too, the most egregious and upsetting instance being Wahlberg asking a bunch of little boys something to the effect of, "None of you are homos, right?" It's supposed to be funny not because Chris is a dumb lout, but because haha, gay people are silly. Bay also throws in some hideously unnecessary scat humor and a startling splash of gore. Ugh, what a putz this guy is, someone we might call an embarrassment to American culture except that his movies tend to do really well. America likes Michael Bay, I'm afraid. And I must admit that, despite all that stuff mentioned above? I didn't hate Pain & Gain.

Bay is helped by the fact that this is an undeniably interesting story. While the details are wildly exaggerated, of course, the bones of the true-crime tale remain intact, and what grisly and bizarre twists and turns it takes. The movie is narratively all over the place, scenes skittering and skipping into one another, the pace quickening or slowing with arbitrary abruptness throughout. (Though title cards do occasionally give us the date, it was hard to tell time during the movie.) But when we return to the center line of the plot, it's a satisfyingly grim look into some bleak American greed and stupidity. And, I must say, Wahlberg is terrific. He's always at his best when he's in this mode, jangly and hyped-up, whiny with desperation at moments of crisis and goofily boastful when he thinks things are going just right. This is a variation on his Dirk Diggler character from Boogie Nights (still his finest performance to date), but there are unmistakable tones of his characters from I Heart Huckabees (all the rapid-fire philosophizing) and The Departed (caustic, foul-mouthed bluster) in there too. He's frequently riotously funny, blessedly devoid of any of the macho self-consciousness he sports in less interesting movies like Contraband or Max Payne. Yes I did just call Pain & Gain interesting. Because it is!

Dwayne Johnson is also up to something here, actually playing a character instead of merely a tower of sinew. Paul was got sober and born-again during a prison stint, but his violent, coke-addled past ain't through with him. His deterioration is what drives the film to its brutal climax, and Johnson plays that free-fall fairly well considering the bluntness of the script and the inattentiveness of Bay's direction. Tony Shalhoub, playing the gang's first mark, a nasty and vituperative fellow, gets in a few juicy scenes too. There are attempts to actually create some characters here, and while Bay ultimately doesn't know what to do with them, always rushing off to make his next dirty joke right when things are getting good, I admire the efforts of the actors. Would that they had another director, and a different script, this really might have been something. Ah well.

All told, I left Pain & Gain wondering how it managed to be both Bay's most off-putting movie and his most artistically successful. On the one side there is the misogyny, the homophobia, the pointless gross-out stuff, and of course the film's choppy and overly aggressive construction. But on the other there's the genuinely compelling crime story, there's Wahlberg's deft work, and all the gorgeous Miami vistas. The city is Bay-ian paradise, filled with sunlight and swaths of garish color. It's a dichotomous picture, both ugly and alluring. In fact I can think of only one recent film that provoked a similar reaction. Forget Fargo. This might be Michael Bay's Spring Breakers.

       

The Drought-Stricken Midwest's Floods: Is This What Climate Change Looks Like?

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The dramatic images resulting from this week's floods in the Midwest are, in a way, a welcome sight. Six months ago, the region was wracked by drought. While the sudden drought-to-flood transition may not be due to climate change, it's close to what some models predict.

High water has been pervasive throughout the upper Midwest, ranging from Michigan to Missouri. CNN reports that the worst isn't over: flooding is expected this weekend in North Dakota, into Illinois, down to St. Louis. Six months ago, much of the region was abnormally dry. The Washington Post's Capital Weather Gang describes how the pendulum has swung.

Since the fall, the most radical changes have occurred in the Middle and Upper Mississippi River Valley where the hydrological state of affairs has flipped. A large part of this area, which received almost no rain last summer, is under flood warnings due to recent heavy rains and snowmelt. …

“Over eight months, runoff in the Upper Mississippi River Basin has jumped from way below average to extremely high – including near record levels in some locations. In August 2012, drought had left runoff in the bottom 10 percent,” Climate Central writes. “... Now, water levels are in the top 95 percent. Obviously April numbers are not final yet, but many locations have already broken their record rainfall for the month.”

The Department of Agriculture's Drought Monitor offers week-by-week data on the level of drought in various regions. Last summer, levels of recorded drought spiked. In August, 38 percent of the Midwest was experiencing extreme levels of drought; in September, over 94 percent of the region was at least abnormally dry.

Compare that with drought conditions in the Northeast over the same time period: Less than 75 percent of the region has been drought-free only twice.

Jeff Masters of Weather Underground explains what's happening in the Midwest.

A warmer atmosphere is capable of bringing heavier downpours, since warmer air can hold more water vapor. … So how can you have worse droughts with more moisture in the air? Well, you still need a low pressure system to come along and wring that moisture out of the air to get rain. When natural fluctuations in jet stream patterns take storms away from a region, creating a drought, the extra water vapor in the air won't do you any good. ... The drought that ensues will be more intense, since temperatures will be hotter and the soil will dry out more.

In other words, a warmer atmosphere from climate change likely yields greater extremes in weather. This syncs with the draft report issued by the government's National Climate Assessment Development Advisory Committee last year. That report predicted the following for the Midwest: "longer growing seasons and rising carbon dioxide levels will increase yields of some crops, though those benefits will be increasingly offset by the occurrence of extreme events such as heat waves, droughts, and floods."

That prediction was meant to be borne out over the next several decades. What it predicted, though, has already been seen over the course of six months.

       

CIA Added Tamerlan Tsarnaev to a Terrorist Watchlist 18 Months Ago

It's not like it's a suprise, but the U.S. intelligence committee is already contradicting itself as the investigation into the Boston bombing unfolds. Turns out the CIA knew about one of the Tsarnaev brothers after all. In fact, the sleuths in Langley added Tamerlan Tsarnaev to a watchlist a full 18 months before the attack on the Boston marathon. The Associated Press     

Anne Hathaway to Conquer Broadway?

Today in show business news: Anne Hathaway may be headed back to the Weimar era, Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore team up once again, and Jennifer Garner will have a bad day too.

Oh dear. Batten down the Broadway hatches. A rumor is swirling that Anne Hathaway, recent Oscar winner for her teary singing in Les Miz, might be headed to the White Way to play Sally Bowles in a revival of Cabaret. OK, well, Hathaway's people completely deny the rumor, but that doesn't mean it's not true! And allegedly she'd be playing Sally opposite Alan Cumming as the Emcee, who, y'know, famously played the role in the last revival, which was a huge smash sensation that ran for years. So that is interesting. Very, very interesting. Of course we can probably all imagine exactly the kind of Sally Bowles that Anne Hathaway would play, but it might be interesting to watch nonetheless? I mean, they will give her a Tony, which will be kind of awful, but awful in a fun way maybe? The way she's always kind of awful? I don't know. It just might be fun to see the theater kid thing really going at full blast. It could be glorious, even. "They should have sent a poet..." we'll all say in the audience, hair blown back like the Maxell guy. [The New York Times]

Well, the next Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore joint is on its way. The Wedding Singer and 50 First Dates duo will next appear in 2014's Blended, a comedy about "a man and a woman who, after a disastrous first date, get trapped at a family resort with their kids from previous marriages in tow. An attraction begins to grow despite comedic mishaps." Yeah, that sounds about right. A little older, a little kiddier, a little of all of that. Adam Sandler gets a bad rap, and in some ways Drew Barrymore does too, but they're always fun together. 50 First Dates isn't a great movie, no, but they're cute in it. And there is no denying The Wedding Singer. That is just a good movie, on a factual level. So who knows! Maybe this Blended, coming May 23, 2014, could be something worthwhile. Or it could be their Runaway Bride. Only one way to find out. [The Hollywood Reporter]

Jennifer Garner has joined Steve Carell in the cast of Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, based on the beloved children's book. Garner will play Alexander's mother, naturally. Normally I'd be really wary about this — I mean we're talking a beloved children's booked stretched to feature film length in terrible, candy-coated 2013 — but this one could be different. See, Lisa Cholodenko co-wrote the script, and Miguel Arteta is directing, and he often makes very good, interesting things. So maybe this will be more in the vein in of Where the Wild Things Are, meaning not entirely successful but certainly not sacrilegious, rather than, say... Cat in the Hat. Fingers crossed, anyway. [Deadline]

Oh, I see now. When we heard that NBC had agreed to move The Tonight Show to New York, people assumed it was because the network was placing a lot of confidence in Jimmy Fallon and doing him a solid, something they didn't do for Conan, who was forced to move to Los Angeles. But! It seems they had an ulterior motive. The network will save some $20 million a year after receiving tax credits. Yeah. That's why. Or, maybe not entirely why, but it certainly doesn't hurt. Maybe some accountant was like "Uh, guys? Take a look at this. Maybe we shouldn't make Jimmy move..." Whatever the case, this is a win-win. Fallon's show has a distinctly New York-y energy, and will change up the comedy scene in New York interestingly, so that's a positive. And, hell, NBC saves a bunch of money. Good for them. There's nothing wrong with this. Still doesn't mean it doesn't burn for Conan, though. Poor Conan. [The Hollywood Reporter]

       

It Could've Been This Easy for Boston's Bombers to Use a Cellphone Detonator

The Associated Press reported Wednesday afternoon that bombing suspects Tamerlan and Dzhokhr Tsarnaev used a remote control of some sort to detonate their two homemade pressure cooker bombs at the Boston Marathon last Monday. The type of detonator the two men used remains unclear, but the Justice Department complaint outlining the charges against Dzhokhar makes very clear that he may have been "manipulating the phone," and that he kept his cellphone to his ear during the first explosion. (Police instructed officers and the press to turn off their phones during the shootout that killed Tamerlan late Thursday night.)

We see cellphone detonators all the time in the movies and on television, which sometimes seem to stretch the limits of even fictional terrorist technology. (Homeland, most recently.) But could two brothers living in Massachusetts have learned to make one — and make it work?

We're not going to get into the complexities of Inspire, the English-language online magazine said to be part of the brothers Tsarnaev's guide to killing four people and injuring scores more — nobody needs more information on how to build bombs. But it seems a little too easy, a little too unsettling, that something carried around by so many nonviolent people could be so easily converted into something so sinister.

You would think making a cellphone detonator would be a complex process, requiring more than a basic understanding of electronics, but that's not the case. We were able to figure it out in a little under an hour with a little bit of Googling and intuition. Indeed, it's a little scary how easy it is to discover how to make something that eventually can be part of a larger, terrifying weapon. 

Plugging a search for "how to make a cell phone detonator" into Google won't turn up anything useful. So the lazy terrorist would be dissuaded fairly quickly. There were cellphone detonator how-to videos on YouTube, but most of them have been scrubbed — and rightfully so — for explaining how to hurt people, because that's against YouTube policy. But Googling around for more than a few minutes will show any violent-minded individual the way around that... 

Fireworks. If you specify that you're building a cellphone detonator for fireworks, then you'll discover a ton of guides on geek hobby sites — and all too quickly. Video guide makers use the guise of making cellphone detonators for fireworks to get around YouTube's do no harm policy. And what did the Tsarnaev brothers recently purchase a large quantity of? Fireworks. There's no confirmed connection between the February fireworks purchase and the Boston bombings, but experts told the New York Daily News that the amount of explosive powder Tamerlan bought from the New Hampshire firework store was enough to build one pressure cooker bomb.

It's all a fairly simple process, really. Once a phone is dissected, there's the vibrator. All someone has to do is solder two wires to the vibrator before putting the phone back together. The two wires soldered to the vibrator have to protrude from the phone. Hook the two wires up to a a hobby fuse and a circuit board — easily purchased at any hardware store — and violence is imminent.

So that's how easy it is to build a cellphone detonator — just like the pressure cooker bombs, they were made with supplies that anyone can find at any number of local stores and online. But we'll ask that you do not try this at home, ever.

       

America Is Giving Generously to Boston Victims, Zach Braff

One of the new features of charitable giving in America is that we've cut out the middle man, opting instead to give directly to whatever cause we see fit. In the aftermath of Boston, some of the week's victims have had more success than others.

Those injured in the blasts, the family of the young boy killed at the race, and the guy whose boat was damaged are all potential recipients of hundreds of thousands of dollars. As of writing, people have contributed over $2.3 million to a variety of grassroots efforts to help offset bills and keep food on the table. Some, like Jeff Bauman, didn't have health insurance to offset the costs of his horrible injuries. Americans have been willing to help.

We found a half-dozen examples of fundraising efforts for Boston victims, and took a look at how they compared.

David Henneberry's Boat

Yesterday, the Boston Police heroically found the missing suspect behind the tragic Marathon Bombing. Thank God we got him! But unfortunately he was hiding in Watertown resident David Henneberry's boat, which was riddled with bullet holes in the standoff.

Let's pool some money for repairs! I'm putting in $500 myself to start this off. David's a modern American hero. The boat will probably be held up as evidence for some time, so if we're able to get up to $50,000 then he'll be able to get a brand new boat!

Amount raised: $13,099.26

Number of donors: 390

 

Martin Richard's family

N.B., The Richards have at least two sites.

On Monday April 15, 2013 - a day Bostonians celebrate, Patriots Day and the running of the Boston Marathon ended in tragedy for The Richard Family and many others. The Richard Family lost 8 year old Martin, and Mrs. Richard and her daughter were critically injured. This fund is set up to help Bill incur any costs (and I am sure there will be many in the coming months) of all this selseless violence.

Amount raised (total): $43,333

Number of donors (total): 754

 

Roseann Sdoia

Roseann Sdoia was severely injured as a spectator at the Boston Marathon on 4/15/13. Roseann suffered serious injuries as a result of the explosions and has lost a leg above the knee. She has undergone several surgeries; first, to stabilize her and perform life saving measures and also to remove shrapnel from her abdomen. Surgery was required to remove a portion of a tree that became a projectile and seriously wounded her left leg. And most traumatic, the amputation of her right leg and burns covering portions of her body. … She is a true Bostonian, living in the city and being one of the most loyal sports fans I know!

Amount raised: $268,629

Number of donors: 3,626

 

Celeste and Sydney

Celeste and Sydney were badly injured in the blasts at the Boston Marathon on 4/15/13. Sydney suffered severe injuries as a result of being hit with shrapnel and Celeste has lost both her legs below her knees. There is a long road ahead - both physically and emotionally - and we're hoping to relieve some of the financial burden by raising funds in their name. Please help spread the word and donate if you can. The outpouring of emotion and support has been nothing less than amazing and the family is extremely grateful for your prayers and warm words.

Amount raised: $631,280

Number of donors: 9,643

 

Jeff Baumann

We have created this fundraiser to raise money to help support our dear friend, Jeff and his family. As most of you know, Jeff was severely affected by the tragedy that had taken place at the Patriots Day Boston Marathon this year. Throughout this difficult time we want to help in every which way we possibly can to get Bauman back on track as soon as possible.

Amount raised: $655,761

Number of donors: 14,241

 

Patrick and Jess

On April 15, 2013 Patrick and Jess both sustained severe leg injuries after one of the bombs went off at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. This GiveForward page has been created by friends of theirs in order to give friends and family a place to post comments of love and support. We are also asking those who feel comfortable to leave a donation that will go towards the medical bills and out-of-pocket costs associated with both of their surgeries and rehabilitation.

Amount raised: $689,241

Number of donors: 11,813

 

The gold standard for these efforts, of course, is Karen the bus monitor.

Karen the bus monitor

Above is a video of a 68-year-old bus monitor named Karen Klein being verbally harassed by a group of middle schoolers on their way home from Athena Middle School in Greece, New York. Throughout the ten minute video, you can hear the kids verbally berate the woman ... Now, I don’t know about you, but that broke my heart. There’s even a point in the video where one of the kids touches Karen’s arm in an attempt to make fun of her. I’m not sure why these kids would want to bully a senior citizen to tears, but I feel we should do something, or at least try.

Amount raised: $703,168

Number of donors: 32,251

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It's worth remembering that it isn't only charity cases for which people are going direct. People are also funding movies.

The Veronica Mars movie

I am currently the happiest blonde in a hamster ball the world has ever seen. [Ed - Etc.]

Amount raised: $5,702,153

Number of donors: 91,585

That's more than twice the amount raised by all of the charitable efforts, combined. Or, if we add it to the graph:

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America is a generous country. But we're more generous in some ways than others. This morning, Zach Braff announced his own Kickstarter, aimed at raising money for a new indy film. It's already raised more than any of the charitable efforts above.

       

Human Skulls Have a Habit of Popping Up at Florida Airports

Two women may be in hot water with authorities after TSA officials discovered pieces of human skull in their carry-on luggage. The question separating these voodoo ladies from some very serious charges is whether or not they knew the skulls were in their onboard pottery. 

ABC's Miami affiliate and CBS Miami report TSA officials discovered sealed pots filled with dirt and "possible human skull fragments" inside the carry-on luggage of two women at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on Wednesday afternoon. NBC 6 Miami reports teeth were also found amongst the dirt, stones and skull pieces.

The two had just returned from a trip to Cuba. The two women claim the pots would "ward off evil spirits" when they purchased them at a "religious-type shop." If that wasn't weird enough, it's not the first time this has happened. 

No, this is not a precedent setting discovery of mysterious skulls at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International. Back in February 2006, a 30-year-old Miami woman was arrested for bringing a human skull back from Haiti to "ward off evil spirits," the South Florida Sun Sentinel reported at the time. (And let's not forget the time in January when 18 human heads — with their skin still in tact — were discovered while passing through customs at Chicago's O'Hare airport in Chicago.) It's illegal to bring human remains into the U.S. without a death certificate. She was a big voodoo practitioner and believed the skulls would ward off evils spirits. 

There's no indication whether the women traveling from Cuba were aware their skull filled pots were actually filled with skulls. We suspect that's what the Broward Sheriff’s Office is trying to sort out right now. The two women volunteered to stay at the airport and tell their side of the story. 

And can you blame them with the punishment they're facing? The woman accused in 2006 faced charges of smuggling human remains into the country without proper documentation and failing to declare the remains to customs which resulted in a potential 15 year prison sentence. We'd volunteer to stay behind too if we were were facing that kind of hard time for buying what they likely thought was a tourist-y memento. Which leads us today's super important lesson: you have to make sure you have the paperwork filled out the next time you're thinking of bringing a human skull back from your vacation.

       

Good News: Boston's Man in the Chair Is Doing Great — and Boston's on Its Way

The investigation presses on. A city and a nation continue to mourn. And, slowly, Boston is getting back to normal. But in the hospitals, where brave surgeons were ready for dramatic surgeries and where there was more good news on Wednesday, there remains one 27-year-old victim of last week's marathon bombings who stands out: Jeff Bauman, who transformed from cheering boyfriend to iconic amputee. And Jeff Bauman, a city and a nation will be happy to hear and see, is well on the road to recovery. Here's an update from the man who's not quite a microcosm, but who will left up your spirits nonetheless:

Jeff Is Still in Recovery — and He Met with His Cowboy Hero!

Bauman remains at Boston Medical Center — his amputations were both below the knee — but he's had his share of visitors. One of them is Carlos Arrendondo, the man in the cowboy hat in that indelible AP photo last Monday, gripping the shredded remains of one of Bauman's arteries. Arrendondo visited him on Monday, The Concord Monitor reports. "I was so happy to see him with his big open-wide eyes and very grateful to be able to hug him and let him know how proud I am of him," Arrendondo said. The paper adds: 

When he saw the extent of Bauman’s injuries and the rapid loss of blood, he knew Bauman needed his help the most. He ripped up a sweater and used it to try to stop the bleeding from Bauman’s legs and immediately got the attention of a woman with a wheelchair. He placed Bauman in the chair and began pushing, but the fabric he used as bandages kept getting caught in the wheels ...

“The picture that you see, that’s what it is and that's how it happened, you know,” he said. “I was just trying to help him in every way I could, and thank God he gave me the opportunity to help this beautiful young man.”

Jeff's Hospital Costs Are Getting Crowdsourced — and We're Getting There!

Enough about the very ugly side of Boston crowdsourcing, people: You've raised over $650,000 in Bauman's honor over at Bucks for Bauman. And those dollars will help him get back on track. As The Boston Globe reports, Bauman, who works the deli counter at Costco, has employer-sponsored health insurance to cover his gigantic medical bills — and the wholesale giant "is also matching donations made by colleagues at the chain's Nashua location."

But Costco might not be to cover Bauman's full medical bills, the final total of which remains unclear at this point in his recovery, but his prosthetics won't come cheap. Think Progress reports: 

Prosthetics can cost up to $45,000 for adults and over $100,000 for children, who need to get them replaced several times as they continue to grow. Rehabilitation treatments for those who have lost limbs can run up $200 per hour. And even for those who were less seriously injured, the emergency room care they received in the immediate aftermath of the explosions could easily top $40,000.

The final cost of treating the Boston victims' injuries, according to Think Progress, will be around $9 million. As The New York Times reports, the One Fund Boston charity is moving fast to support other victims. The organizers of Bauman's fundraising drive have capped the total they're seeking at $1 million, meaning Bauman is about $350,000 away from his supporters' goal. Indeed, there are many victim fundraising efforts raising many different levels of donations — here's a breakdown from The Atlantic Wire's Philip Bump. A similar fundraiser for two other victims, 18-year-old Sydney Corcoran and her mother, Celeste, has raised about as much with $630,720. 

Jeff Is Making Friends — and the Victims Are Preparing for a Long Haul

Oh, and about Sydney: She turned 18 on Tuesday, when Bauman paid her a visit down the hall at Boston Medical Center, where they're all undergoing recovery work. Sydney had her femoral artery severed in the blast and recently "took her first steps since the blast," Sydney's uncle told the Los Angeles Times.

On the day of the attack, Sydney was at the marathon with her mother. They were both cheering on Sydney's aunt. Celeste lost both her legs in the attack and had them amputated below the knee: "I can't do anything right now," Celeste told the L.A. Times, before a joke as dark and honest as it is strangely uplifting: "Running's never been my thing because I always get the most horrible shin splints," Celeste told the paper. "So I was like, hey, I don't even have shins anymore — I'm not going to get any shin splints!"

The stories from Bauman and the Corcorans are perhaps some of the most shared and hopeful tales of recovery in Boston right now, but they're going to have tough journeys ahead of themselves. "Unfortunately, reconstruction is still just the start of the long road to recovery for these patients. For those that have surgeries without complications, they will still need to heal their wounds and start the lengthy rehabilitative process with physical and occupational therapy," Eric Bluman, an MD PhD with experience (like many other Boston doctors helping victims recover) in Iraq, says in a release by the American Orthopaedic Foot & Ankle Society. "Many will suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder even after their wounds have healed and their physical function improves." 

Jeff Is a Hero — and Don't You Forget It

If you're not familiar with the Bauman family, go read Tim Rohan's profile in The New York Times again. But surely we're all far too familiar with the Tsarnaev family by now. But remember: Bauman played a role in identifying the suspects, even while he was intensive care. Bauman, as Bloomberg reported in the grisly aftermath of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's capture Friday night, helped identify a man in "a cap, sunglasses and a black jacket over a hooded sweatshirt" — the suspect we now know today as Tamerlan Tsarnaev. While its unclear if the FBI consulted any of Bauman's fellow victims, it is clear that his ID'ing Tamerlan helped the FBI's frenzied investigation. 

...and Don't Forget That He Is Just One of 264 of the Injured in Recovery

"[I]t now appears that every one of the wounded alive when rescuers reached them will survive," The New Yorker's Atul Gawande triumphantly reported last Wednesday. And this Wednesday, that appears to be coming true. Though health officials have revised the number injured in the Boston bombings to 264, the fatalities from the bombing remained at three. "About 48 people remained hospitalized as of Monday," reported Reuters, citing Boston health officials. And the AP adds, "The only person to reach a hospital alive and then die was one of the suspected bombers — 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnaev." Their breakdown looks like this: 

As of Monday, 51 people remained hospitalized, three of them in critical condition and five listed as serious. At least 14 people lost all or part of a limb; three of them lost more than one.

Two children with leg injuries remain hospitalized at Boston Children's Hospital. A 7-year-old girl is in critical condition and 11-year-old Aaron Hern of Martinez, Calif., is in fair condition.

The surviving bombing suspect, 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, is in serious condition at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center with a neck wound.

Stay tuned right here for the latest from Boston, where Boylston Street was back in business on Wednesday — and where the marathon finish line remains:

The Finish Line #wbz #Boylston st twitter.com/BerniceWBZ/sta…

— Bernice Corpuz (@BerniceWBZ) April 24, 2013

"I am absolutely certain that next year's Boston Marathon will be bigger, more spectacular and attended by more people than ever," Vice President Joe Biden said Wednesday, at the memorial service for MIT police officer Sean Collier, who died last Thursday night.

       

Tatum and JGL Might Be the New Sinatra and Brando in a 'Guys and Dolls' Remake

When you see guys like Channing Tatum and Joseph Gordon-Levitt reach for stars in the sky, you can bet that their doing for some dolls. Maybe. 

Deadline reveals that Fox has snagged the rights to Guys and Dolls, the 1950 musical turned 1955 movie musical based on Damon Runyon stories about gamblers and their love lives. And in the key roles of Nathan Detroit and Sky Masterson, Fox wants Tatum and Gordon-Levitt.

This is in no way a done deal, but it is surely an interesting development, which would put Tatum and Gordon-Levitt in position to step into the shoes of two of the biggest performers of all time, Frank Sinatra and Marlon Brando. Of course, this being a musical that's undergone a number of revivals, a wide range of actors have played these roles. If we're interpreting Deadline's phrasing correctly, and Fox wants Tatum for Nathan and Gordon-Levitt for Sky, that would mean that Tatum would take on a role once played by Nathan Lane. Now that's a weird thought.

Gordon-Levitt has basically been begging for a musical theater role ever since he did "Make 'Em Laugh" on Saturday Night Live. We know that Tatum can dance, both to "Pony" and to more classical fare. (And, let's remind ourselves, that Sinatra was a fantastic singer, Brando was not known for his vocal talents, and he did sing in the film, even though his was the role Sinatra wanted.)

If Fox really has their claws in these two, then the next question is who they'll cast in the equally important female roles: the show-girl with a cold Adelaide and the do-gooder Sister Sarah Brown. Our bets? For Adelaide: a comedienne like Anna Faris or Ari Graynor. Sarah Brown's a little trickier: Anna Kendrick, who could also do Adelaide? Amanda Seyfried? Or, maybe, God help us Anne Hathaway? She may or may not be headed to Broadway in another classic musical, after all.