Atlantic Monthly Contributors's Blog, page 831

'Real Housewives of New York' Heralds New Countess-Lite Season

The RHONY superteaser looks appropriately crazy/fantastic/terrible, but what of this news that Countess LuAnn DeLesseps will only be a recurring housewife this season?

E!Online has an interview with the Countess in which she confirms that she will be absent from the new season's first three episodes, and that she will in fact be only "recurring" this season.

"The show has been a part of my life for so long," LuAnn said. "There's a special place in my heart for the show, for the women, I'm really close to the women on the show. I just made the decision to step back so I can spend more time doing my things with business and my family.

"It's a win-win for me," she continued. "I'm still on the show. I'm still very much a part of the show, but it's not a fulltime thing. It's very engulfing when you're on it. It takes up all of your mental and physical energy."

Does this mean LuAnn is pulling a Camille Grammer for this sixth season? Pulling herself out of the main cast only to snipe away from the sidelines, before going away for good the next season? Dear Jesus Andy Cohen please at least tell me that LuAnn will remain in the opening credits. We need to see what bon mot she's chosen to introduce herself with this year. "A countess remains chic in any language," perhaps? Or "The only things deeper than my voice are my loyalties"?

So while the Countess decides to focus more time on pursuing "acting gigs" (cue this reaction), The Real Housewives of New York have added a new cast member, Kristen Taekman, ex-model, youngest of this current Housewives cast, and friend of Beverly Hills' Brandi Glanville, which could portend shit-stirring.

After a look at the season six trailer, here's what else we could ascertain:

The ladies will don drag-queen costumes for their network-mandated appearance on a Pride parade float. [CORRECTION: Coney Island Mermaid Parade, not Pride Parade. We got our super-gay summer parades mixed up.] For at least the third consecutive season, Sonja Morgan is an absolute trainwreck of a person, throwing doggie funerals and repeatedly losing her partial tooth.  Legless mass of neuroses Aviva Drescher loudly fights with seemingly every single cast member, including previously neutral parties Carole Radziwill, Heather Thomson, and the Countess. New-girl Kristen apparently runs afoul of Sonja, Heather, and perpetual new-girl foe Ramona Singer. Ramona maybe possibly throws something at Kristen's face and draws blood while they're both swimming/canoeing in a lake. Kristen's husband looks exactly like Lance Armstrong. Aviva's creepo father is back, saying things like, "Ramona is a bitch, and you know what happens to bitches? They get fucked by dogs." Heather calls Aviva a "motherfucker," continuing 2013's streak of ostensibly classy ladies saying "motherfucker," including Sandra Bullock in The Heat and Julia Roberts in August: Osage County. The superteaser ends with the most haunting image imaginable:

The full supertease:

       

Janet Yellen Is Definitely the New Fed Chair

AP

Janet Yellen has, as expected, now been confirmed by the Senate as the next chair of the Federal Reserve. When she takes over for the departing Ben Bernanke, whose last day is January 31, she will become the first female chair ever and, very possibly, the most powerful woman in US history (at least until the New York Times gives Hillary Clinton the presidency in 2016).

Though Yellen's confirmation was approved 56-26, that was actually the slimmest margin of victory in the Fed's century-long history, as the New York Times pointed out (Bernanke's most recent term, his second, was approved 70-30 in 2010). There were also fewer votes cast, as the POLAR VORTEX prevented several senators from getting to work.

Interestingly, 11 Republicans broke ranks to vote for Yellen, who is the first Democratic nominee since 1979. Less interestingly, all 26 "no" votes were from Republicans.

President Obama nominated Yellen in October, after his first choice, Larry Summers, withdrew from consideration. Yellen has been the vice chair since 2010; before that she ran San Francisco's Federal Reserve Bank. She's also taught at Harvard and UC Berkeley.

    

Rogue Typesetting Fells 'Transformers' Director Michael Bay at CES

Michael Bay, acclaimed director of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, appeared to have some serious—we mean serious—problems with a prompter at CES today. So many problems that he left the stage all a-fluster. According to The Verge, Bay, the filmmaker behind Transformers: Dark of the Moon, was there to talk about Samsung's curved HDTV.

Everything started off okay with him explaining that his job is to "dream for a living," but things started to go awry. "The type is all off, sorry, but I'll just wing this," said the 48-year-old director of the upcoming Transformers: Age of Extinction, after stalling. After pledging to persevere past typeface-based obstacles and "wing it," much like the heroic Autobots would do in such a situation, Bay paused. He was asked to talk about how "the curve" will impact how people watch his movies. Bay stared at the screen, perhaps contemplated changing forms from a man into perhaps a van or a fire engine, then said, "excuse me, I'm sorry," and walked off. The audience response was awkward to say the least.

Michael Bay has also directed The Island, Pearl Harbor, Bad Boys, Bad Boys II, The Rock, and Armageddon. The teleprompter, as far as The Wire has been able to ascertain, has not directed any feature films. 

For an alternate look at Bay's incident watch below. (Via)

Update Bay explained himself on his blog, writing: 

Wow! I just embarrassed myself at CES – I was about to speak for Samsung for this awesome Curved 105-inch UHD TV. I rarely lend my name to any products, but this one is just stellar. I got so excited to talk, that I skipped over the Exec VP’s intro line and then the teleprompter got lost. Then the prompter went up and down – then I walked off. I guess live shows aren’t my thing.

       

It's Pretty Cold, So Senator Inhofe is Rambling About Climate Change

YouTube

With the Polar Vortex threatening us all this week, Senator Jim Inhofe took to the Senate floor on Monday to run through just about every reason he personally does not think climate change is a real thing. Because it's cold outside! Get it?

The Oklahoma Republican, in cause you weren't aware, believes that climate change is made up and pushed on the American public as "science" because of a giant evil conspiracy (seriously, he wrote a book about this), so his decision to take to the floor with his beliefs on Monday shouldn't be a huge surprise. Cold weather is more or less a written invitation for Inhofe to show up and talk about his personal feelings climate change. Here are his feelings today: 

Inhofe has a bunch of concerns here, the first of which pertains to, in his words, "what's happening right now, up in Antarctica," a reference to the unusually thick ice forming on earth's southernmost continent. Somehow, to Inhofe, the anecdote of multiple ships getting trapped in that ice over the past months renders the evidence for climate change "almost laughable." Inhofe's counter-evidence to the consensus of over 95 percent of climate scientists also includes more anecdotes, especially those showing how it is sometimes cold when people want to talk about climate change. Here are the examples he cited: 

It was cold during a 2004 "global warming rally."  It was also cold during a 2007 media briefing on a climate bill.  Another 2007 rally was snowy  Al Gore gave a speech at Harvard, and it was cold.   The British House of Commons discussed global warming, and it snowed. It was October, and that's pretty rare.  In 2008, Al Gore discussed global warming in Milan, and it snowed. This is also extremely rare. In March of 2009, Nancy Pelosi had a "big global warming rally" and it snowed. The Department of Public Works once had a hearing about climate change, and it snowed.

Inhofe added that he believes "the ones that were responsible for the whole global warming movement was the United Nations." And even though the scientific research into climate change actually helps to explain the unusual weather patterns behind the recent arctic chill in much of the U.S., Inhofe seems to think that the cold weather actually supports his theory, apparently because it, too, makes a good anecdote. Those ships trapped in the antarctic ice also make a good anecdote for Inhofe, because one of the vessels was carrying scientists who were researching the effects of climate change. Funny! 

Inhofe then tries to transition this anecdote into a kind of unfortunate discussion of arctic sea ice (which is melting at an accelerated rate). As we've explained before, the ice near the two different poles are two very different things, suggesting that Inhofe is failing to understand not only that anecdotes aren't equivalent to data sets, but also the difference between the arctic and antarctic regions of the Earth. 

       

Predicting the 2014 Top Ten Box Office Hits

AP

With 2013 behind us and a slate of not-good January movies on the horizon, it's hard to get excited about what 2014 has to bring (considering these meager offerings) ... which is why we're going to predict the biggest blockbusters of 2014. If we could fast-forward to May we would—not just to get as far away from the polar vortex as possible, but to get to all the great movies that 2014 has lined up for us. Nothing sounds better to us right now than buying a giant popcorn and soda, sitting in air-conditioned movie theater, and watching the lights go down and Michael Fassbender's jawline appear on screen. 

Picking box-office winners is a tall order, though. Just ask [insert name of fired Hollywood executive], right? Sorry, [first name of previously named Hollywood executive], just playing. But predicting the fickle tastes of the American audience is a good way to drive yourself crazy. Still, come on, it's not like America hasn't shown their cards more than a few times over the years. Superheroes, sequels, animated films. This is pretty much the pool we're drawing from.

Without further delay, then, here are our best guesses for the top box-office winners of 2014:

10. Gone Girl 

Here's the dark horse. The success of the Twilight movies, along with The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, changed the the way we think about the relationship between books and movie ticket sales. Gone Girl has that Twilight/GWTDT kind of readership that authors and studio executives would throw their grandmothers down stairs to have.  

9. One of Those Hobbit Movies

The Desolation of Smaug was pretty good, and it seemed to convince people (including this Hobbit hater) that Peter Jackson was more on his game compared to to Unexpected Journey. That's good sign for his final movie. 

8. Divergent

Divergent kind of seems like it has all the tools to break the curse of the Young Adult feature film. Beautiful Creatures should have been more popular, Mortal Instruments didn't make use of pretty good material and readership, and Vampire Academy ... woof. Divergent feels like a the designer impostor version of Catching Fire— dystopian futures, girl who starts a revolution, said girl is a pretty good actress — and with all the success Catching Fire garnered, that might not necessarily be a bad thing. 

7. Fast and Furious 7

Both the fifth and sixth Fast movies have landed in the box-office top ten, so there was little reason to think this wouldn't as well. Unfortunately, production delays mean this movie won't happen until 2015. So, yes, people will see the franchise's farewell to Paul Walker, just not for another year. 

6. Guardians of the Galaxy

Here's my bet: Guardians of the Galaxy is going to make more money than Captain America: Winter Soldier. Let's be real: Captain America is kinda boring and he Chris Evans is better playing off with an ensemble. Also, GoG is going to feature a character named Rocket Raccoon — a walking, talking, raccoon, played by Bradley Cooper. That alone is more interesting than anything Captain America has done in the last couple of years. 

5. Amazing Spider-Man 2

Amazing Spiderman 2 will also be more fun than Captain America. It will also make more money. 

4. How to Train Your Dragon 2

Animated movies are a fixture on year-end box office lists (see: the Madagascar franchise). With no Pixar movie slated for 2014 and no Madagascar film either, the stage is set for the How to Train Your Dragon sequel to get the rightful attention and possibly critical acclaim it deserves. 

3. X-Men: Days of Future Past

For some reason, the people in charge of the X-Men franchise firmly believe that people can't get enough (but we have!) of Wolverine's overwrought backstory — so much that they're willing to go away from everything good in First Class (a lot of it revolved around new characters and utter lack of Hugh Jackman) and seemingly turn DoFP  into another Wolverine and The X-Men special (in the comic arc, it's actually Kitty Pride that gets sent back in time). But there are things that even another maybe-boring Wolverine-centric arc can't hold back. Like Ian Mckellan, Patrick Stewart, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Fassbender, and ticket sales. 

2. Godzilla

People are really excited about Godzilla. I cannot explain this. I don't know who is in this (an Olsen sister and the guy from Kickass apparently). I don't know what the new story line is. I don't think I care to know.  I'm just, like plenty of other people, irrationally excited for this movie: 

1. Mockingjay: Part I

Catching Fire is about to walk away with 2013's box office crown, and there's no reason that Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, the rest of the cast and newcomers like the one and only Julianne Moore won't be poised to do the same in 2014. With a solid improvement from the first to second movie, and additions like Jena Malone, the franchise is ensuring that the odds will be ever in their favor. 

Other Contenders: With Fast 7 bumped to 2015, consider any of these a good bet to join the top 10: Maleficent (a movie ticket in exchange for endless discussion about Angeline Jolie's cheekbones); Rio 2 (animated movies make killings); Transformers (Transformer movies makes killings too); Neighbors (because Zac Efron). 

 

       

Team USA's Next Big Olympic Stars: A Guide

YouTube/ The Wire

With the Sochi Olympics coming up next month, it's time to get to know the potential new stars of Team USA. We've focused on the athletes expected to make the trip to Sochi, either because they have a great chance to win gold, or because NBC will gab about them non-stop.

Only a few sports have announced their official rosters — others, like snowboarding and bobsledding, require athletes to compete for spots on the Olympic team until barely a week before the games.

J.R. Celski and Eddy Alvarez — Short Track Speed Skating BFFs.  Best buds at the Olympic Trials in January.

Why You'll Hear About Them: They are adorable, talented friends since childhood who will support but compete against each other in Sochi. And Alvarez's back story is pretty dramatic: the first Cuban-American to make the U.S. Olympic team, Alvarez underwent major surgery after failing to qualify for the 2010 games, only starting up his training again in 2012. 

What to Look For: Celski is the big medal contender here. He won two bronzes in Vancouver in 2010, and performed strongly at trials for a spot in Sochi.  Meryl Davis and Charlie White — U.S. Figure Skating's Big Hope Davis and White at World Championships

Why You'll Hear About Them: The U.S. usually does really well in figure skating events, but probably not in 2014. That's why Davis and White, who compete as ice dancers, are such a big deal this year for American fans. Qualifiers are still ongoing for figure skating selections, but the American pair have an extremely solid record nationally and internationally. 

via Tumblr.

What to Look For: Davis and White — fans call them Marlie — are so charismatic they have inspired art GIFs like the one at left from heltra91 on Tumblr. They earned world record scores at the Grand Prix Final in Japan in December. Marlie has a good chance of becoming the first Americans to win an Olympic gold medal in ice dancing.

Phil and Amanda Kessel – The Super-Scoring Hockey Siblings From "The Best of Phil Kessel" on YouTube.

Why You'll Hear About Them: Besides the adorable, quirky relationship the two share, they are both among the best at what they do — making a small round black piece of rubber go into a net. Oh, and she's perhaps the best player in a family full of NHL-worthy boys. 

Phil usually plays for the Toronto Maple Leafs, the NHL's biggest franchise, so the Olympic spotlight is child's play by comparison. As one of Team U.S.A.'s premiere goal scorers, Kessel's stick and skates will have to produce big numbers to lead the team past the Russians and through the Canadian squad that defeated them to win gold in Vancouver. 

via Tumblr.

Amanda is among the best female hockey players in the world right now and she still hasn't graduated college.  As a junior playing for the juggernaut Minnesota program in the NCAA last season, Kessel led all scorers with 101 points. (The next best player, Minnesota teammate and another likely Olympian Hannah Brandt, had 82 points.)

What to Look For: Phil should be deadly when unleashed on the larger international ice surface used for Olympic play. Look at how Kessel (here playing for the Boston Bruins) undresses this Montreal Canadiens defender and puts the puck in the net before the goalie can react to his shot. Just filthy, as they say in the rink. 

Amanda's vision and scoring ability are something to behold. Plus, she has experience leading U.S.A. Hockey over those dastardly Canadians. Here she is single-handedly defeating the northerners in international play last summer: 

Jessica Jerome — First in Flight  Jerome at the Olympic Trials.

Why You'll Hear About Her: It's never easy to get to the Olympics, but Jerome and the rest of the women's ski jumping team — still in selection — had an even harder time of it. The International Olympic Committee added the event in 2011, and only after a group of female athletes filed suit against the organization for discrimination. Jerome was the first to qualify for a spot on the team in late December, but will likely not be alone. 

What to Look For: Jerome is part of a talented group of women, who mainly trained out of Utah. And the U.S.'s Olympic prospects for medaling in the new event are pretty great. They include Lindsey Van, something of a pioneer in women's ski jumping, and one of the leading forces behind the push to get an Olympic women's ski jumping event in the first place. Want to know more? The New York Times did a big profile of the U.S. national team. 

Shani Davis — Veteran Medalist  Davis at the 2010 Olympics.

Why You'll Hear About Him: Davis is about to fly to his fourth Winter Olympics. The long track speed skater won gold on the 1,000 meters in 2006 and in 2010, meaning that a win in Sochi would he his third consecutive gold for that event. If he does that, Davis would be the first American male to win gold in that event for three consecutive games. In 2006, Davis was the first black athlete to win an individual gold medal in any Winter Games event. 

What to Look For: Davis qualified for more than one event this year, but the stakes are the highest for the 1,000 meters. The skater also holds the current world record in that event. He's not too shabby at the 1,500 meters either, however: he won the silver in that event in 2006 and 2010. 

Lindsey Vonn - Status Unknown Vonn losing her balance in a December race.

Why You'll Hear About Her: Given Vonn's gold-medal performance in 2010, the answer should be obvious: her downhill skiing ability is often discussed with a thesaurus of superlatives. But Vonn had a bad season leading into Sochi, so she'll be watched for an entirely different set of reasons. Plagued with injury after injury this season, Vonn hasn't even skied in two weeks. And, she's likely to skip even more events between now and February's games. It's possible that Vonn may end up sitting out Sochi itself.

What to Look For: If she makes it to Sochi, Vonn will almost certainly attempt to defend her gold medal in downhill. While Vonn might be one of the most successfully branded American winter athletes ever, her actual performance in Sochi is far from guaranteed to match Vonn at her best. Even though it looks like Vonn will have a spot on the team if she wants one, new (frankly, kind of confusing) qualifying requirements could keep her limited to just two events, thanks to her inactivity on the slopes this season: downhill and super-G.

Taylor Gold – The 20-Year-Old Snowboarder  Gold at the Sprint Grand Prix in December

Why You'll Hear About Him: His name is not Shaun White, Louie Vito, or Greg Bretz, the three veterans most expect will compete for Team U.S.A. You don't know Taylor Gold, the youngster with an appropriate last name, who leads a pack of teens and barely 20-somethings making challenging the sports' old guard. He has tricks difficult enough to compete with the best, and style for days

Gold at the same competition.

What to Look For: Just before Christmas, at an Olympic team qualifying event, Gold came in first over a White-less field of competitors with a stacked half-pipe run that included this effortless-looking 1260 degree spin, a trick every snowboarder hoping to medal will need to produce.

His very next trick was a "double Michalchuk," a modified double backflip that's easy enough, but when Gold does it the result could cut through butter. These are the tricks he'll have to lay down in front of Sochi judges to make his name come true. 

Lolo Jones — The Two-Sport Star Jones, left, after her first bobsled race in 2012.

Why You'll Hear About Her: Because she's Lolo freakin' Jones, is why. Beyond that, Jones isn't a lock for the Olympics yet — she's competing for one of three positions as a brake(wo)man on the bobsled team. But she's doing really well, having finished second at a recent event when paired with Olympic lock Elana Meyers, who had only good things to say about Jones. 

What to Look For: Whether or not she makes the team. As great as crossover stories are, U.S.A. bobsledding decides which athletes will represent the country based on skill, especially in this crowded field, not marketability. Bur regardless of how the qualifying shakes out, Jones will still be all over your television. 

       

'Saturday Night Live' Adds Sasheer Zamata

YouTube/PunchApp

After vowing to hire a black woman after facing controversy earlier this season, Saturday Night Live has hired Sasheer Zamata. A UCB alum, Zamata will appear on the next episode January 18 featuring Drake as host and musical guest, according to Nellie Andreeva of Deadline. 

The long-running show came under fire as their season began for hiring a freshman class that was almost entirely white-male. Comments from current cast member Kenan Thompson, who said that the cast didn't have black women because they weren't "ready" in auditions, did not help things. When Kerry Washington appeared as host in November, the show mocked its own lack of diversity by having her play a number of high profile black women in the cold open sketch. In December, news emerged that the show was specifically auditioning black women to join the show in January. According to Bill Carter of the New York Times, Lorne Michaels said "that he had committed to that timetable to add the show’s first black woman since Maya Rudolph left the series in 2007. " 

Zamata comes from SNL feeder the Upright Citizens Brigade, and, according to her Tumblr, she likes "acting, writing, dancing, thrift shopping, crafts, laying on roofs, laying in parks, learning new things, bows in my hair, fantastical dreams, endings that are more real than happy and New York." 

Here she is telling the story of a guy who flashed her from the perspective of the flasher: 

And here she is in a sketch from Above Average, a YouTube Channel from Michaels' Broadway Video. 

       

Polar Vortex Cripples Oil Production In Cruel Climate Change Twist

REUTERS/Jim Young

The polar vortex, the crippling North Pole hurricane that is turning boiling water turn into snow and wreaking havoc with air-travel across the nation, is also threatening oil production and hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, from North Dakota to Texas. That ironic twist is hitting anti-environmentalist climate change deniers right where it hurts.

Even though some of our leading intellectual minds have argued that global warming could not possibly cause cold weather, climate scientists beg to differ. According to the actual experts, increasing temperatures have led to arctic melt, which has warmed up the temperature in the North Pole. The warmer air, in turn, has caused the polar vortex, usually confined to the cold northern region, to travel south, enveloping us in its icy furor. An icy furor that is having a little fun at the expense of oil companies, as the freezing temperatures have taken a bite out of production. Reuters reports: 

Analysts are bracing for a possibly worse than usual impact on output from the state, that could affect operations of companies such as Continental Resources, Marathon Oil and Hess Energy. The companies did not immediately reply to questions about operations on Monday... Freezing temperatures affected production in the Permian Basin in west Texas in December, with companies like Pioneer Natural Resources reporting cuts in their oil and gas output.

The freezing weather is not only blocking oil drilling and fracking, but bringing oil prices down. The environmental effects of fracking are disputed, but recent reports of the practice contaminating water sources have emerged, and international organizations are saying that U.S. investment in hydraulic fracturing is making the country seem like it doesn't care about global warming, as fracking leads directly to the burning of more fossil fuels, which contribute directly to climate change.

So oil drillers get blamed for global warming... global warming causes the polar vortex... the polar vortex shuts down the oil companies. It's the circle of drilling. The polar vortex is set to pass in a few days, but who knows when, and at what force, it will return. We have a feeling Mother Nature is not messing around. 

       

The Super Bowl Sex-Trafficking Story That Just Won't Die

AP

What happens when tens of thousands of football fans, 3,000 members of media, and untold numbers of corporate executives descend on one little city for the Super Bowl? Stories about an explosion in sex work, naturally. With Super Bowl XLVIII on the horizon, it's now time for the annual "here come the prostitutes" story, an annual exercise is fear-mongering over a threat that never materializes.

The premise is this: thousands of football fans — almost all men — are going to travel to New Jersey (or Miami or Tampa or Phoenix) for the biggest sporting event of the year. They are in a strange town, with money to burn, and an atmosphere full of testosterone. Naturally, they will seek out strip clubs and prostitutes, who in turn, will be shipped into the city by the bus-full by illicit sex traffickers trying to meet the demand of Super Bowl Weekend. 

"When you're about ready to have 400,000 men come to this area of the country, you're invariably going to have more people try to take advantage of that by providing prostitutes and prostitution," New Jersey's Bergen County Prosecutor John Molinelli told the AP, who is promising a crackdown as his area prepares to host the big game.

Stop us if you've heard this one before. Because you probably have. The same story was written about the Super Bowl host city in 2011 and again 2010 and again 2009 ... and again before basically every Super Bowl in living memory. (The Super Bowl has even been called the single largest human trafficking incident in the United States.) Every city that hosts the NFL title game goes through this, but there's one problem with the narrative. It isn't exactly true.

In 2012, The Houston Press's Peter Kotz thoroughly tore apart that story, explaining that law enforcement officials in the cities where past Super Bowls occurred never actually saw increases in prostitution busts or the number of trafficked prostitutes, even despite increased efforts to catch johns, pimps, and traffickers. "We didn't see a huge influx in prostitutes coming into Tampa. The arrests were not a lot higher. They were almost the same," a Tampa police spokeswoman said in 2009, and a police spokesperson in Phoenix said in 2008 that there was nothing out of the ordinary: "We may have had certain precincts that were going gangbusters looking for prostitutes, but they were picking up your everyday street prostitutes," and not foreign women "imported" for the event.

Further, the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women (GAATW) — which has a vested interest in promoting this topic — said in a report that there's no correlation between sporting events and a rise in prostitution. "There is no evidence that large sporting events cause an increase in trafficking for prostitution," the organization concluded. They also included this table which looked at the world's biggest sporting events, and the lack of evidence to back what they essentially say is a "myth."

The history of those events make this year's claims of trafficking even harder to believe and bring up questions of the gullibility of the media. The "Super Bowl = prostitutes" story begins to look more and more like a lazy journalistic trope or an urban legend. Or more cynically, a cheap attempt by some local politician using the Super Bowl media blitz to score points by standing up to the menace of sex work.

To be clear, sex trafficking is a legitimate issue outside of the convenient Super Bowl news bubble. But again, there's no evidence that a mass influx of sports fans increases the problem or contributes to it in some way. Ultimately, spreading misinformation can end up undercutting efforts to bring awareness to the very real problem of sex trafficking and forced prostitution. Focusing only on the Super Bowl and quick fixes like ramped up police patrol, doesn't address the bigger, ongoing problem of sex exploitation. As Rachel Lloyd, founder of the Girls Education and Mentoring Services (GEMS) organization, wrote for the Huffington Post in 2012:

We've focused on quick fixes and good vs. evil responses that rarely address the true causes or empower the young people that we're serving. In doing so, we've played right into the hands of those who'd like to deny that this is even happening, those who are profiting handsomely from the continued exploitation.

Sadly, that probably won't keep Phoenix from reliving the story again in 2015.

       

This Is What the Long-Term Unemployed Look Like

Kelsey Devoe fills out a contact form at a job fair in Florida last August. (ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Americans who've been out of work for half a year or more look different than the newly unemployed. They're older, slightly better educated, and less likely to be white.

It's perhaps a different image of the unemployed than members of Congress might be expecting. Whether or not this group sees a renewal of unemployment benefits — cut off late last month — has become the first contentious issue of the new congressional session. On Monday evening, the Senate will vote on a proposal to extend them for another three months, but, according to NBC News, that extension is likely to fail.

Last year, Josh Mitchell of the Urban Institute decided to find out who the long-term unemployed actually are, compiling data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and producing a short report outlining his findings. The Wire spoke with Mitchell by phone on Monday, primarily to find out if the data, produced last summer, provided an accurate picture of the population that Congress is considering.

"The demographic profile is relatively stable over time," Mitchell said, suggesting that his findings likely still provide a good look at the population of long-term unemployed — 4.1 million people in the country last November. (An estimated 1.3 million were affected by the December cuts, and Mitchell wasn't able to say if they matched the same demographic breakdown as the overall pool.)

For the most part, the long-term unemployed look like the larger pool of unemployed Americans, both those newly out of work and those who've become discouraged by the job market, temporarily or permanently dropping out of the labor pool. But they look more like the population of employed Americans than do the newly unemployed.

They are older than the newly unemployed.

This chart (like those that follow) compares four populations: the long-term unemployed (people out of work 27 weeks or more), the newly unemployed (those unemployed for fewer weeks), those who've dropped out of the labor pool, and those with work. In this chart, the darker bars indicate older people.

The make-up of the long-term unemployed looks somewhat more like the population of employed people than other unemployed groups. A full one-fifth of the population is between 46 and 55 years old. Half as many long-term jobless people are under the age of 26 as among the newly unemployed. Which is part of the reason that they're harder to employ: older workers tend to have higher salaries when they lose their jobs.

Notice that the percentage of discouraged workers that is aged 56 to 65 (the darkest bar) is higher than for the long-term unemployed. Often, as North Carolina saw when it ended insurance for the long-term unemployed, older workers will leave the labor force.

They are more likely to be African-American.

While nearly two-thirds of the employed population is white, according to Mitchell, just under half of the population of the long-term unemployed are not. Particularly, the long term unemployed are about 50 percent more likely to be black than a member of the newly unemployed.

They are slightly better educated.

Compared to the newly unemployed group, the long-term unemployed are more likely to have a high school education — 64 percent of the long-term unemployed graduated from high school but not college, compared to 60 percent for the newly unemployed.

What's stark about this chart, though, is how the populations of the unemployed compare to that of the employed. Ninety-one percent of the employed have at least a high school education. One of the reasons that older people might be more likely to drop out of the workforce is that that, as a Senate report noted last spring, "workers in this age group are less likely to pursue additional job training and education." A 55-year-old isn't as likely to go get the college degree that would open more doors.

The long-term unemployed still constitute well over a third of the unemployed population in America. They're people who are less likely to be able to reenter the workforce — obviously — in part because they tend to be the sorts of workers that cost employers more money. But not, at this point, the United States government.