Helen H. Moore's Blog, page 164

This device can stop pollution where it starts — while creating clean energy

(Credit: AP Photo/Matt Dunham)

In September, a group of more than 40 health and environmental experts released one of the most comprehensive reports to date on how dirty air affects human health — and the findings are grim. The researchers linked air pollution to 6.5 million premature deaths in 2015, totaling 11.5 percent of all deaths worldwide that year. Air pollutants can also enter the food supply and contribute to climate change, so scientists around the world are seeking ways to thwart this ongoing problem.

One such solution, publicized last year by a pair of Belgian universities, has the potential to destroy pollutants before they enter the environment, with an added bonus: clean energy production.

The prototype device, designed by the University of Antwerp and KU Leuven, is only a few centimeters in size, but with further development, it could one day fight some of the most dangerous man-made pollutants on an industrial scale while producing energy.

AlterNet caught up with Sammy Verbruggen, researcher and professor at the University of Antwerp and KU Leuven, to find out more about this process and how his team has continued to develop it since their research hit the newswires back in May.

How it works

The Belgian research teams created a small device with two rooms separated by a membrane. Air is purified on one side, and the degradation of pollutants produces hydrogen gas, which is stored on the other side.

The technology is based on the use of specific nanomaterials in a process called photocatalysis, Verbruggen told AlterNet by phone. “[The process] uses a semiconductor that is irradiated by light energy to generate free charge carriers. These charge carriers, in turn, produce reactive oxygen species that can attack fouling components.” Specifically, the device can eliminate any organic compound — which includes pesticides like DDT, as well as industrial pollutants such as dioxins and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Many of these organic pollutants are particularly concerning because they “bio-magnify throughout the food chain and bio-accumulate in organisms,” according to the World Health Organization.

As pollutants are broken down, “protons are extracted from the molecules and migrate to another compartment of the device, where they are reduced to hydrogen gas,” Verbruggen explained. Cell devices like this are most commonly used to extract hydrogen from water, but it turns out the process is even more efficient with polluted air — which is a huge revelation. “It’s actually easier to perform these reactions with fouled components rather than pure water.”

Large-scale potential creates keen interest

The team’s research generated fast buzz. “We received quite a lot of interest from all regions of the world, especially regions centered around India and China,” Verbruggen told us.

Air pollution caused more than 4 million premature deaths in 2015 in India and China alone, and both countries continue to struggle with dangerously high pollution levels. Although China has seen marginal improvements in the three years since it “declared war” on air pollution, inhalable pollutant levels remain over four times higher than WHO’s recommended limit, and cities like Beijing still experience “airpocalypses.” In November, the air grew so toxic in India’s capital, New Delhi, that officials made the unprecedented decision to close 4,000 schools for almost a week.

This process can indeed help industrializing countries curb pollution, but maybe not in the way they’d expect.

“They’re really interested to incorporate this in cities, but in my personal point of view, that would become quite difficult,” Verbruggen said. “Then you have to turn it into an active system rather than a passive system, and you have to invest energy to suck pollution out of the air.”

 Rather than vacuum pollution from dirty city air, the device is better suited to capture waste gases before they ever enter the environment. When mounted at a manufacturing facility, for example, the device could passively capture and eliminate volatile organic compounds that would otherwise be emitted or flared off — while producing hydrogen gas that can be converted into electricity onsite via a fuel cell.

“The beneficial energy recovery should be a net gain,” Verbruggen explained, “and as soon as you start investing energy to direct polluted air toward the device, the net balance will become negative again.”

The next step

After the warm reception of their first prototype, Verbruggen and his team are working to perfect their process. “We have to take it step by step,” Verbruggen told us. “We are now working on several prototypes that are more easily manufactured with cheaper materials, and we’re also investigating some alternative materials that can interact better with sunlight. As soon as we have a suitable combination of both, then we can start thinking about the next step, which is upscaling to larger dimensions.”

The device only needs light to function, but it will need to absorb light energy far more efficiently to be viable on a larger scale. “The catalysts we’re using now basically only absorb UV light, which is a very minor part of the solar spectrum,” he explained. “Now we’re trying to modify these materials so they can also efficiently interact with visible light in order to expand the activity window of our device.”

It may be a while before we see manufacturers using devices like this to prevent pollution, but Verbruggen told AlterNet and other outlets that he is optimistic about the concept. “There’s still a lot of work to do to make this applicable to daily life,” he told Mic. “It’s not like we discovered the holy grail yet, but this is a new field of opportunities.”

Marjory Stoneman Douglas School shooting is America’s 18th in 2018

Wayne LaPierre (Credit: AP/Evan Vucci/Reuters/Jonathan Ernst/Photo montage by Salon)

Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel confirmed that 17 people were killed after a gunman opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida on Wednesday.

A 19-year-old former student was taken into custody and sent to the hospital for sustained injuries, the Associated Press reported.

In the last year, we’ve seen the deadliest mass shooting, the deadliest church shooting and the deadliest high school shooting in modern U.S. history.

“There are numerous fatalities. It is a horrific situation,” Robert Runcie, the Broward County schools superintendent, told CNN. “It is a horrible day for us.”

Donald Trump took to Twitter to express his “prayers and condolences,” a common response from the president who has yet to address the issue of gun violence in America.

My prayers and condolences to the families of the victims of the terrible Florida shooting. No child, teacher or anyone else should ever feel unsafe in an American school.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 14, 2018

Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said it’s “that terrible day you pray never comes.”

School in #BrowardCounty still active scene.Will take some time to clear.Local authorities will be providing more details to public soon.

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) February 14, 2018

But it does, and this day keeps arriving—almost at least once or twice a week now this year. This school shooting marks the 18th school shooting this year, according to Every Town Research, and the 290th shooting since 2013.

According to a FBI report, “The School Shooter: A Threat Assessment Perspective,” school violence is an “epidemic” in America and the number one risk factor is “easy access to weapons.” That report was created under Former Attorney General Janet Reno when Bill Clinton was president—the problem is still the same though years later.

In Florida, in order to carry a concealed handgun, a resident must be 21-years old to carry a weapon, but exceptions can be made if the applicant is in the armed forces. Florida is known for not having a “duty to retreat” law, meaning if you’re attacked you can defend yourself, even if that means killing the other person.

“We know stronger gun laws reduce gun violence,”  said Shannon Watts, Founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Safety in America in a statement. “Every American must commit to taking action to end gun violence – we must demand more than ‘thoughts and prayers’ from our lawmakers, and they must find the courage to be part of the solution and finally put a stop to this.”

The best photo of the Trump White House wasn’t taken there

A great photographer I once worked with once told me that when you make a photograph, you’re making are record of someone else’s truth, not yours. But over the years, I’ve found that sometimes it’s the other way around. Last week’s coverage of the ignominious downfall of Trump’s “staff secretary,” Rob Porter, was just such a time.

Porter was accused by two ex-wives and an ex-girlfriend of hitting and kicking and choking one, and grabbing and shoving the other one, and calling all of them “stupid bitch” and “fucking ridiculous” and screaming a lot. For days, they ran photos of this guy. There was the photo of Porter standing behind Trump as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus handed him an executive order to sign on one of the early days in the Oval Office, when Trump was signing the things daily, trying his best to look like he was keeping his campaign promises by banning Muslims, cutting regulations, reorganizing the federal government, expediting environmental reviews. There was Porter and his girlfriend, Hope Hicks, the White House “communications director,” walking across the tarmac of Andrews Air Force Base, headed for the stairs to Air Force One. Harvard man Porter is in his preppy dark blue suit and rep tie and black oxfords, carrying a briefcase, and Hicks is in a summery dress, its hem blowing in the breeze, wearing very high heels and carrying an oversize bag in one hand and a cell phone in the other. Just two go-getters jetting off to Hamburg for the G-20 summit, or Taormina, Sicily for the G-7 summit, or someplace important, anyway, because that’s what you do when you work in the Trump White House. You show up, and you do important shit, and (in Hicks’ and Porter’s case) you look good.

It’s very, very important in the Trump White House to look good. Your hair is perfectly coiffed, or slicked down and parted. The clothes you wear are tasteful and expensive. You’re slim, and toned, and your stride is purposeful, and you don’t look over at the gaggle of photographers shooting you, because they are there to record you amidst the trappings of power. They photograph you getting on Air Force One, because Air Force One is a trapping of power. They photograph you in the Oval Office, because it’s  another trapping of power. The portico behind the West Wing leading to the Rose Garden is another trapping of power. Rob Porter and Hope Hicks have been photographed over and over again with these trappings of power, because it’s all that matters in the Trump White House. It’s what they actually do. They inhabit the trappings of power, and they look good doing it, because that’s their goddamned job.  All those photos of Rob Porter and Hope Hicks really are them, because they record all there ever was of them.

Who the hell are these people, anyway? What the hell is a “staff secretary?” Oh, we’ve been told over and over again how important he was in the White House. He was Chief of Staff Kelly’s “right hand man.” Before that, he was “right hand man” for Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. His office is right outside the door to the Oval Office. All of this means he was Important. Powerful. Big.

But what the hell did he do? What did the men he worked for do? Priebus was supposed to make the trains run on time, but the White House was pure chaos while he was in charge in the West Wing. They fired him and brought in former Marine General Kelly, who (we were assured) would impose discipline on the White House, presumably so Trump could be a better president. What have we had? Even more chaos. More midnight tweets. More staff firings and people quitting the White House. According to the Washington Post, no less than 37 people have either quit, been pushed out, or fired while Trump has been president. The New York Times reports that the White House has had a turnover of 34 per cent over the first year of Trump’s presidency, the highest ever, more than twice that of any other president. Is that what Rob Porter, the “right hand man” has been doing in the White House? Keeping track of everybody as they fled out the door? Is that what a “staff secretary” does? Apparently.

What the hell has Hope Hicks been doing? She’s supposed to be the White House “communications director.” Have you ever heard her communicate anything? Presumably, she’s in charge of the White House press operation. Well, let’s have a look at how well she’s done with that. Press Secretary Sean Spicer? Out. Communications something-or-another Anthony Scaramucci? Out. Deputy Press Secretary Michele Short? Out. Public Liaison Director George Sifakis? Out. Director of communications for the office of Public Liaison Omarosa Manigault? Out. Deputy Assistant Sebastian Gorka? Out. Communications Director Michael Dubke? Out.

Meanwhile, what does the White House communicate? Well, they’ve got those press “briefings” by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who stands there like a schoolmarm and answers simple questions by saying she doesn’t know, because she hasn’t talked to the president about that subject. And we’ve got Trump’s tweets, thousands of them, at all hours of the day and night. During 2017, Trump tweeted 2,417 times, according to the Boston Globe. Good job, Hope. Now go touch up your make-up and get ready to walk across the White House lawn to the Marine One helicopter. In your $800 thigh-high boots. Or your $1,000 Jimmy Choos.

You want to know what the White House is to these people? It’s not a job, it’s a background. It’s not power, it’s pantomime, because to have power, you’ve got to exercise it. If you’re a “staff secretary” like Porter, with access to all of the top secret material he’s supposed to have seen without a security clearance, you’ve got to actually do something with it, don’t you? I mean, the other thing we learned last week is that Trump skips most of his top-secret security briefings, and the ones he does get are all given orally now, the briefers having dispensed with the charts and graphs and photos they were using previously.

So if Trump has apparently never laid eyes on all the top secret stuff Porter was processing, what the hell was he doing? Moving it from his in-box to his out-box? Checking off some line that says “received,” and then forwarding it on . . . where? If you’re the president’s staff secretary, and you don’t forward this super-secret stuff to the president because he doesn’t read it, then what the fuck do you do?

And then the other day we learned that Porter was in for a big promotion. He was said to have become “more interested in policy,” so he was going to be elevated to deputy chief of staff, or something that sounds big and important. But working policy? In the Trump White House? For a man who doesn’t know the difference between Medicare and Medicaid? Who doesn’t know a budget deficit from the national debt? Who gets his “policy” ideas from “Fox and Friends?” Come on.

All we’ve really known about any of these people are photographs and news footage. They didn’t really do anything in the White House, so we have to rely on are photographs, and what those pictures tell us is that they are hollow, well dressed people amidst the trappings of power. They stand around the Oval Office behind the president and watch him. That’s what happens in the Trump White House. He likes to be watched, so people like Rob Porter stand there and watch him. He likes to be photographed, so he has photographers come in and take pictures. It’s one of his trappings of power.

But the best photo we have of Rob Porter wasn’t taken in the White House, and it’s not of him. It’s the photo of Porter’s first wife, Colbie Holderness, with her black eye.  It’s a photo of the one thing we know that Rob Porter actually did. He beat his wife. It’s a photo of misogyny and violence. It’s the best photo we have of the Trump White House.

The best photo we have of the Trump White House is Colbie Holderness and her black eye

(Credit: Getty Images/Salon)

A great photographer I once worked with once told me that when you make a photograph, you’re making a record of someone else’s truth, not yours. But over the years, I’ve found that sometimes it’s the other way around. Last week’s coverage of the ignominious downfall of Trump’s “staff secretary,” Rob Porter, was just such a time.

Porter was accused by two ex-wives and an ex-girlfriend of hitting and kicking and choking one, and grabbing and shoving the other one, and calling all of them “stupid bitch” and “fucking ridiculous” and screaming a lot. For days, they ran photos of this guy. There was the photo of Porter standing behind Trump as Chief of Staff Reince Priebus handed him an executive order to sign on one of the early days in the Oval Office, when Trump was signing the things daily, trying his best to look like he was keeping his campaign promises by banning Muslims, cutting regulations, reorganizing the federal government, expediting environmental reviews. There was Porter and his girlfriend, Hope Hicks, the White House “communications director,” walking across the tarmac of Andrews Air Force Base, headed for the stairs to Air Force One. Harvard man Porter is in his preppy dark blue suit and rep tie and black oxfords, carrying a briefcase, and Hicks is in a summery dress, its hem blowing in the breeze, wearing very high heels and carrying an oversize bag in one hand and a cell phone in the other. Just two go-getters jetting off to Hamburg for the G-20 summit, or Taormina, Sicily for the G-7 summit, or someplace important, anyway, because that’s what you do when you work in the Trump White House. You show up, and you do important shit, and (in Hicks’ and Porter’s case) you look good.

It’s very, very important in the Trump White House to look good. Your hair is perfectly coiffed, or slicked down and parted. The clothes you wear are tasteful and expensive. You’re slim, and toned, and your stride is purposeful, and you don’t look over at the gaggle of photographers shooting you, because they are there to record you amidst the trappings of power. They photograph you getting on Air Force One, because Air Force One is a trapping of power. They photograph you in the Oval Office, because it’s  another trapping of power. The portico behind the West Wing leading to the Rose Garden is another trapping of power. Rob Porter and Hope Hicks have been photographed over and over again with these trappings of power, because it’s all that matters in the Trump White House. It’s what they actually do. They inhabit the trappings of power, and they look good doing it, because that’s their goddamned job.  All those photos of Rob Porter and Hope Hicks really are them, because they record all there ever was of them.

Who the hell are these people, anyway? What the hell is a “staff secretary?” Oh, we’ve been told over and over again how important he was in the White House. He was Chief of Staff Kelly’s “right hand man.” Before that, he was “right hand man” for Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. His office is right outside the door to the Oval Office. All of this means he was Important. Powerful. Big.

But what the hell did he do? What did the men he worked for do? Priebus was supposed to make the trains run on time, but the White House was pure chaos while he was in charge in the West Wing. They fired him and brought in former Marine General Kelly, who (we were assured) would impose discipline on the White House, presumably so Trump could be a better president. What have we had? Even more chaos. More midnight tweets. More staff firings and people quitting the White House. According to the Washington Post, no less than 37 people have either quit, been pushed out, or fired while Trump has been president. The New York Times reports that the White House has had a turnover of 34 percent over the first year of Trump’s presidency, the highest ever, more than twice that of any other president. Is that what Rob Porter, the “right hand man” has been doing in the White House? Keeping track of everybody as they fled out the door? Is that what a “staff secretary” does? Apparently.

What the hell has Hope Hicks been doing? She’s supposed to be the White House “communications director.” Have you ever heard her communicate anything? Presumably, she’s in charge of the White House press operation. Well, let’s have a look at how well she’s done with that. Press Secretary Sean Spicer? Out. Communications something-or-another Anthony Scaramucci? Out. Deputy Press Secretary Michele Short? Out. Public Liaison Director George Sifakis? Out. Director of communications for the office of Public Liaison Omarosa Manigault? Out. Deputy Assistant Sebastian Gorka? Out. Communications Director Michael Dubke? Out.

Meanwhile, what does the White House communicate? Well, they’ve got those press “briefings” by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who stands there like a schoolmarm and answers simple questions by saying she doesn’t know, because she hasn’t talked to the president about that subject. And we’ve got Trump’s tweets, thousands of them, at all hours of the day and night. During 2017, Trump tweeted 2,417 times, according to the Boston Globe. Good job, Hope. Now go touch up your make-up and get ready to walk across the White House lawn to the Marine One helicopter. In your $800 thigh-high boots. Or your $1,000 Jimmy Choos.

You want to know what the White House is to these people? It’s not a job, it’s a background. It’s not power, it’s pantomime, because to have power, you’ve got to exercise it. If you’re a “staff secretary” like Porter, with access to all of the top secret material he’s supposed to have seen without a security clearance, you’ve got to actually do something with it, don’t you? I mean, the other thing we learned last week is that Trump skips most of his top-secret security briefings, and the ones he does get are all given orally now, the briefers having dispensed with the charts and graphs and photos they were using previously.

So if Trump has apparently never laid eyes on all the top secret stuff Porter was processing, what the hell was he doing? Moving it from his in-box to his out-box? Checking off some line that says “received,” and then forwarding it on . . . where? If you’re the president’s staff secretary, and you don’t forward this super-secret stuff to the president because he doesn’t read it, then what the fuck do you do?

And then the other day we learned that Porter was in for a big promotion. He was said to have become “more interested in policy,” so he was going to be elevated to deputy chief of staff, or something that sounds big and important. But working policy? In the Trump White House? For a man who doesn’t know the difference between Medicare and Medicaid? Who doesn’t know a budget deficit from the national debt? Who gets his “policy” ideas from “Fox and Friends?” Come on.

All we’ve really known about any of these people are photographs and news footage. They didn’t really do anything in the White House, so we have to rely on photographs, and what those pictures tell us is that they are hollow, well dressed people amidst the trappings of power. They stand around the Oval Office behind the president and watch him. That’s what happens in the Trump White House. He likes to be watched, so people like Rob Porter stand there and watch him. He likes to be photographed, so he has photographers come in and take pictures. It’s one of his trappings of power.

But the best photo we have of Rob Porter wasn’t taken in the White House, and it’s not of him. It’s the photo of Porter’s first wife, Colbie Holderness, with her black eye.  It’s a photo of the one thing we know that Rob Porter actually did. He beat his wife. It’s a photo of misogyny and violence. It’s the best photo we have of the Trump White House.

“Everything Sucks”: Another feat of Netflix engineering

Jahi Di'Allo Winston and Peyton Kennedy in "Everything Sucks!" (Credit: Netflix/Scott Patrick Green)

Lots of TV series have that “engineered in a lab” glint about them. The same can be said of entertainment properties across genres and mediums, mind you. Runaway success breeds imitators if not outright clones, few if any can match the original.

“Everything Sucks!” has that feel about it, only in this case, the lab is Netflix, and the borrowed strands of DNA comes from within its own vials. It cannot be an accident that the series about teens in a fictional Oregon town named Boring can easily be described as “13 Reasons Why,” minus the sorrow or “Stranger Things” with the supernatural element. Here, the focus is on simple slacker humor at first; the high school is named for the town and the team mascot is the Beavers, and that’s good for a snort. It depends on the chemistry of its personalities and themes of awkwardness and discovery that extend from adolescence well into adulthood. That, and it’s a ‘90s era period piece as opposed to catnip for Children of the “80s.

Call it the end-result of algorithmic research, or more evidence of a company’s following the audience habit, or polishing its brand’s focus.  Whatever it may be, the 10-episode season dropping Friday is nowhere near as appealing in its initial episodes as the series namechecked here.

However, Netflix is making a solid bet that you will watch “Everything Sucks!” until it gets better. Season 1 is easy to binge — none of the episodes goes over 30 minutes, with most clocking between 22 or so and 26 – and it has the benefit of being very much like other Netflix series the service knows you’re watching.

Thematic, data-informed branding is smart for a service like Netflix, but it also implicates worrisome times ahead for series powered by themes and subject matter that doesn’t easily hook into existing successes within the company or popping in the culture at large. For while shows like “Everything Sucks!” are serviceable, and this one even grows into thoughtful, moving show about love and identity by its fourth or fifth episode, half-hours like “One Day at a Time” are struggling to survive the service’s relatively new era of cancellation.

Every streaming service is going through such growing pains right now, shedding series that aren’t meeting whatever mysterious expectations they have of them at a rate that, to be honest, is reasonable in comparison to their broadcast and cable counterparts. Netflix cancelled Maria Bamford’s avant-garde comedy “Lady Dynamite” recently, for instance, despite its wide critical acclaim. It was like nothing else on the service, or on TV in general. A quality that would have been to its credit in earlier seasons, but is likely a factor in its undoing.

Similarly, critical acclaim may not be enough to save “One Day at a Time,” a series that made many critics’ best of 2017 lists but, week after its second season dropped, may be on the chopping block according to its co-showrunner Gloria Calderón Kellett.

HUGE favor: If you want to support me & the show then PLEASE watch & tell friends & family to watch at least FOUR episodes in the next few days. Netflix decides what gets picked up based on views. I love this show & love writing this relatable family. PLEASE WATCH! Thank you.

— Gloria Calderón Kellett (@everythingloria) February 13, 2018

Should “One Day at a Time” be denied a third season, blame corporate branding logic and whatever formula is driving Netflix’s decision making. For example, audience match: “One Day at a Time” is a multi-cam, like “Fuller House,” but the audience that watches “Fuller House” may be more likely to find parallels in the themes “Everything Sucks!” dances with.

Or, brand familiarity: “Fuller House” is a spinoff of “Full House,” a series whose success in syndication inspired this new chapter. The names attached to a series can be crucial. Case in point: Netflix lured Shonda Rhimes over to its fold from 20th Century Fox Television (soon to be acquired by Disney, which is gearing up to launch its own streaming service), and as of Tuesday, snagged Ryan Murphy away from Fox in a deal rumored to be somewhere in the ballpark of $300 million.

A Netflix show from Rhimes or Murphy, freed from broadcast’s FCC-guided standard and practices departments, is likely to draw many more eyeballs from the get-go than a reboot of a late ‘70s series by the legendary Norman Lear, starring the iconic Rita Moreno.

“One Day at a Time” stands as one of the best series Netflix has to offer, and the second season matched the power of its first. But, although Netflix doesn’t release any data about its content’s performance, I’m guessing more of its viewers are familiar with “Fuller House” as a brand than “One Day at a Time,” the overwhelming critical acclaim and recommendations for the latter notwithstanding.

There’s room for all of these series on Netflix, surely. But the secret sauce of decision making at the service may be willing to give more rope to the “Everything Sucks!” journey through 1996 nostalgia, one commencing as a fumbling attempt to marry comedy and teen drama but evolves into a tenderhearted coming-of-age and coming-out story. There are the obligatory references to Zima and memory-jogging tunes by Oasis and Tori Amos, and era-specific films like “The Craft” get their shout-outs as well.

Another surprising charm of “Everything Sucks” is the care with which is handles the development of friendship because a gay character and her close friend (Peyton Kennedy and Jahi Winston) and deftly parallels their awakening with stories of their parents (Patch Darragh and Claudine Mboligikpelani Nako) two people also in the process of shedding old identities to emerge into fresh chapters. Their subplot has as much weight and beauty as the show’s contrived rivalry between the A.V. nerds and drama club that opens the season, eventually resulting in a merger to make a student film.

Having the patience to get to the point where all of this pays off is up to the individual on the couch. Maybe assurances about the story’s satisfying outcome in the back half of the season, particularly over the four episodes that close its arc, will interest enough viewers to buy “Everything Sucks!” the second season it angles for in the final frame of the first.

Even if it takes a while for audiences to catch on, “Everything Sucks!” matches well enough with the rest of the streaming service’s ecosystem: It is its own thing, just like many of the other Netflix shows we’re already binging.

No, everything doesn’t “happen for a reason”

Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I've Loved by Kate Bowler (Credit: Franklin Golden/Random House)

Nothing is fair. The meritocracy is a myth. Bad things happen to good people.

Most of us pretty much know this already. Yet we are also instinctively hopeful, can-do creatures, who like to think that if we can just crack the code somehow, we can prosper and avoid suffering. For some, that wishfulness takes the form of vision boards and dog-earing “The Secret.” For others, it’s striking bargains with God.

Kate Bowler is a Duke Divinity School professor with a Christian background. She was also, until recently, perhaps best known as an expert on prosperity gospel teachings and author of a book on the subject called “Blessed.” Then in 2015, at the age of 35 and with a young son, she was diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer.

Today, Bowler is still alive, cautiously surviving on treatments including immunotherapy, and has a new memoir of her experiences with the down-to-earth title “Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved.”

As a fellow Christian and member of the Stage 4 club, I was eager to devour Bowler’s book as soon as I heard about it. We spoke recently via phone about God, grace and what prayer can — and can’t — give you.

You studied prosperity gospel, you’ve written about it a lot. But you yourself never pushed all your chips in towards the prosperity.

No, I didn’t. I’m a naturally reluctant person to rush in with judgment. I did try for over a decade to fully understand empathetically the kind of worldview that makes the prosperity gospel possible. Like the idea that we’re all living under an open heaven and anything that if you pray for and hope for it the right way, it can be yours. Sometimes I found it absurd. Sometimes I found it exploitative. But it was too easy to say just that because everyone has the caricature of the weeping televangelist in their minds.

This book was kind of a theological excavation project for me. I thought I was just trying to render a world plausible in which someone could be that, I guess, arrogant to hope for all and expect all these things. Then the second I got sick I felt, “Wow, maybe I was just like them all along. Maybe I always thought that my life was something I could orchestrate.”

It’s not just about Christianity. There’s this pervasive idea of manifestation; that you’re going to vision board your way into or out of something.

I was part of my own multilevel marketing presentation! The way I’ve been thinking lately is that every day is full of possibilities and inevitabilities, and you don’t know which are which, right? This lie I was trying to abandon, that the whole world relies on me, quickly became exaggerated in cancer world. All of a sudden, I have to like fight like hell to be in the right place at the right time in order to get the right treatment. I just kept not learning that lesson over and over again because it was so useful. It’s one of the book’s useful lies, like, “I am in charge of all things. Just give me the keys.”

It’s almost easier when it’s your own story, because when it’s someone else’s, you want control and you have none.

I think everyone in pain is probably narcissistic to some degree. I’m just realizing that I really only saw the world from my perspective. I’ve been learning. Now I’m starting to notice what my parents must have been going through and what my husband must have been going through, which is a sense of exaggerated hopelessness and helplessness.

My dad, he’s very careful with his words. From second one, he just refused to cry about it. He refused to imagine that I would not be healed. That was a lifeboat for me, when I needed somebody to not move into helplessness, especially when they just can’t fix me. I’ve borrowed that confidence all the time. Maybe the next round of drugs is going to be really effective. But for everyone else, I think it’s really hard to know what to feel when you generally have no control over something that’s just about to destroy your life too.

It’s so surreal.

That is the word. Very often I just felt, and feel like, I’ve been floating above. I think that the things that define most people’s lives, like the breakfast to eat, and the decisions they make, all that seems like it was part of a normal and rational word that I no longer lived in. I was living in this surreal word where I was part of these decisions partly that I was making and mostly other people right before me that would determine me no matter how I felt about it. Almost all the major things, all the things that would largely decide if I live or die, are things that I don’t get to choose. That’s not how I see myself, right? I see myself as like at the beginning of a decision tree. I make the decisions.

Once you go through something like this, it’s like a certain veil has been pierced about the illusion of how much control you have over your life, and how much control you have over your future.

I almost took it personally. The part that would make me cry is that I thought, “Man, I guess I really did think I was special.” I couldn’t believe that cancer didn’t care about who I was. All the things I’ve chosen to love — my beautiful, perfect, absurd kid, this man I loved for a million years — it just didn’t care. I couldn’t imagine myself being able to surrender every good thing for this thief, this poisonous juggernaut that was headed my way.

It’s so hard to reconcile that, to feel like, “Well, wait a minute, but I’ve been good, I’ve done all the right things.”

I just decided that there are impossible things to give up. Those are the most beautiful ones. I just decided that if God was going to come close to me in the midst of that, it could not be to ask me and pretend to be benevolent about it, no way.

You talk about that so much in the book and you talk about these unhelpful things that people say to you. People will say “Well, I’m praying for you.” I’ve really had to step back and ask myself, “What does that mean? What are you praying for?” What is your understanding of faith? When you are praying for something, what does that look like?

Well, I’m praying for miracles, which is to say the interruption of the world order. I’m praying for good science and healthcare coverage for everybody. I’m praying for both rational and irrational things, because I really do believe that part of prayer is about the dignity God gives us to have enough arrogance to ask. I think that’s just part of love. God loves us in our particularity and knows that we want. I think we’re allowed and encouraged to ask for particular things. Of course, there’s a difference between being able to ask and being able to expect. But I just go for it, I really do. I pray for complete healing.

I don’t mind when other people pray for those things too. In fact, I started to get really grouchy at some of my more liberal friends because I feel like, for them, prayer was an exercise in manageable expectation. I mean, “Dear God, I hope for just vaguely nicer things.” I’m like, “No, no, this is the worst. I need you to put your back into it right now. Don’t give me vague hope.” It felt a lot like love to hope for the most for me, but without me having to then carry the burden of responsibility of explaining why it didn’t happen. It’s not my burden to bear that there are theological conundrums. I don’t know, it would be great if you can figure it out, but it’s actually not my job right now. My job is to live, to figure out what hope means and learn to live after certainty. That’s my job. If I can learn from other people, amazing. But part of that is watching them learn to hope with me without them forcing me to have lived some kind of formula that was supposed to work out.

I often want to just pull out all the stops, ask the universe to just rain down massive miracles. Yet, I also have to pray for the grace to deal with whatever happens. To find God in my community, to find God in the people who hold me up when I feel like I can’t stand on my own two feet.

It’s so basic and it’s so supernatural at the same time. That’s how my experience of God is. It’s in the very, very everyday acts of people who took me to the airport so I could fly to get my treatment and brought me food for a year and were not embarrassed to be afraid with me and pray for me in such gorgeous ways. Their gift of God’s presence was so very ordinary, but it was so beautiful.

I do feel like I have been humbled. People surprised me with how gracious they were and I didn’t realize how much I needed them.

That really is where the grace is and that’s where I find God in all of this, running parallel with science. To me, they’re never in conflict and I don’t have to choose.

So, the Prosperity gospel is not the same thing as Pentecostalism. After I got sick, I loved the joyous prayers of Pentecostals. Here’s what I learned from them: They are not worried about the time. I heard when other people prayed for me, it was very polite and took about 22 seconds. The truth is I was in so much pain physically, emotionally, everything. It was nice when people would just linger with you. They just stay put, and they will pray for you until you’re done, and they don’t care what time it is. That was lovely, and that was the kind of prayer that feels wraps you up in much better spiritual bubble wrap before it pulls you back out into the world. One of strengths of this Christian community is prayer without formality, prayer without — and I mean it in the best way — dignity. They don’t care, they’re just in it.

I want to ask about how we have to really change the conversation around cancer in general. How do we stop looking at it in terms of “cured” and look at this as a long-term condition that we’re managing?

This is partly why I’ve been trying to ask people to stop calling me “terminal.” It really hurts my feelings! It’s because we have this thin vocabulary from where we are right now and hopefully we’re moving to a point where cancer can become a manageable illness. But in the meantime, ask everyone to find a different statement than just “cured” or “dying” because I know I’m neither. I think of it like I’m swinging vine to vine, like I grab on to one vine in immunotherapy and then hopefully one just moving me from one good outcome to another. It will require a different imagination and a different way to set horizons. Instead of imagining an unlimited future, learn to hope for another good thing and then just saying, “It’s not perfect, but it’s enough.”

There’s so much in this world that I cannot change. What is possible today? I ask myself that every day. It’s the only way I can balance the idea that everything is inevitable and that everything’s possible.

This conversation has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.

Ben Shapiro is mad that black people are excited for “Black Panther”

Ben Shapiro (Credit: AP/Leah Hogsten/The Salt Lake Tribune)

Conservative political commentator Ben Shapiro is upset that black people are excited about “Black Panther.”

The editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire and and host of “The Ben Shapiro Show” ranted Tuesday that he wasn’t sure why there was such joy and acclaim in advance of the new Marvel film that featured mostly black artists and creatives in front of and behind the camera.

“‘Blade’ was not enough,” Shapiro quipped, referencing the 1998 film and subsequent two sequels that starred Wesley Snipes.

“Everyone in the media is talking about the most important thing that has ever happened in the history of humanity, or at least since Caitlyn Jenner became a woman — a transgender woman,” Shapiro said. “And that of course is the release of ‘Black Panther.'”

“We’ve heard it’s deeply important to millions of black Americans, who, after all, were not liberated from slavery 200 years ago, and liberated by the civil rights movement with federal legislation, and have not been gradually restored to what always should have been full civil rights in the United States,” he continued. “None of that has mattered up until they made a Marvel movie about a superhero, who is black, in a country filled with black people.”

Shapiro’s sarcasm was confusing, especially for someone whose broad point was that the U.S. is a land of equality. But his monologue went on.

“‘Blade’ was not enough. ‘Catwoman’ with Halle Berry, no,” he said, listing off Marvel films that featured black stars, but ignoring the much longer list of Marvel films that had an all-white cast.

“This is the most important moment in black American history, not Martin Luther King, not Frederick Douglass, not the Civil War, not the end of Jim Crow, none of that,” Shapiro said. Because, according to the man commonly described as a leading intellectual among conservatives, black joy should only exist after an era of white brutality or terrorism against black people.

Settling into his riff, Shapiro extended his critique of  “Black Panther,” deriding the film as poorly disguised identity politics, and pulled former President Barack Obama into the fray.”When Obama was president, we were told it meant everything,” Shapiro said, “And then, it turns out, it didn’t mean anything, because we needed Chadwick Boseman to somehow make sure that black people felt accepted in American society, because a bunch of white executives at Marvel green lit a film about black people in a fictional country in Africa.”

As Slate political correspondent Jamelle Bouie said, “I guess we can add ‘black people being excited about a movie’ to ‘things that trigger Ben Shapiro.'”

i guess we can add “black people being excited about a movie” to “things that trigger ben shapiro” https://t.co/JXVxI1eMVi

— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) February 14, 2018

“listen, we gave you equality on paper and a Wesley Snipes movie, what more could you want?”

— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) February 14, 2018

It’s certainly a long, long list.

Michelle Obama created a Valentine’s Day mix for Barack, and it’s a gift to us all

Barack Obama and Michelle Obama (Credit: Getty/Nicholas Kamm)

The Obamas come up with increasingly charming ways to celebrate the major milestones in their relationship – and this Valentine’s Day is no exception.

On Tuesday, Michelle Obama embraced the age-old tradition of making a mixtape for your crush, tweeting out the link to her husband of 25 years. But it’s really a gift to us all.

“Happy #ValentinesDay to my one and only, @BarackObama. To celebrate the occasion, I’m dedicating a little Valentine’s Day playlist to you!” Michelle wrote on Twitter. She attached a link to the Spotify playlist, which is appropriately titled “Forever Mine: Michelle to Barack.”

Happy #ValentinesDay to my one and only, @BarackObama. To celebrate the occasion, I’m dedicating a little Valentine’s Day playlist to you!

The Stormy Daniels saga just got a lot more interesting

Stormy Daniels (Credit: AP/Damairs Carter)

Oh, Michael Cohen, what have you done?

President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer may have opened a can of words Tuesday by releasing a statement in which he admitted that he paid adult film actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 just before the 2016 presidential election. The payment, according to the Wall Street Journal, was in accordance with a non-disclosure agreement that prevented Daniels — whose real name is Stephanie Clifford —  from talking about an alleged 2006 sexual encounter with Trump at a golf tournament.

In 2006, Trump was already married to Melania Trump, who had just given birth to the couple’s only child, Barron.

Because Cohen admitted to the $130,000 payment, Daniels’ manager told the Associated Press, the attorney had violated the non-disclosure agreement. That means that Daniels can finally tell all.

There is no way this isn’t a win-win for everyone except residents of the West Wing. For starters, we now seem to have the confirmation of a non-disclosure agreement that existed between Cohen (representing Trump) and Daniels. That’s something Daniels avoided talking about when she was on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” a couple of weeks ago. And now that the non-disclosure agreement has been established — and broken — Daniels can talk to whomever she wants about any alleged affair. This could end up making her very rich.

There’s no good outcome for Trump here, however. The president has blustered that he would sue outlets that have reported on his various alleged personal misdeeds, as well as the dozen or so women who have accused him of sexual misconduct since he began his presidential campaign. But he never has, and filing a lawsuit would open a world of problems.

If Trump, or even Cohen, ever decided to sue Daniels, the alleged affair would be front and center. As in, “why was there a non-disclosure agreement signed?” With more detail, here’s legal analysis from NBC News:

The real reason that Trump probably will never sue is this: Reciprocal discovery.

The discovery process is designed to enable the parties to uncover evidence from an adversary through the disclosure of documents and records, and can require sitting for a (transcribed) deposition. The rules are to be “liberally construed” to authorize “extremely broad” discovery. Parties to a lawsuit may force disclosure from the other side of any non-privileged matter that is relevant to any party’s claim or defense.

While that analysis actually refers to potential lawsuits resulting from Michael Wolff’s White House tell-all “Fire and Fury,” the details would hold true in this case as well. In any legal discovery process, Trump’s sex life — and the conduct of anyone else who might have tried to keep bad news out of the headlines while he was running for president — would become fair game.

Aside from the salacious details — an affair, a cover-up, White House denials — Daniels’ claims are important for another reason. Cohen has been dogged by a Federal Election Commission and Justice Department complaint from the liberal watchdog group Common Cause. The group has suggested that the payment to Daniels was a violation of campaign-finance disclosure laws. Cohen is trying to rebut that charge by claiming that he was the one who paid Daniels, and the funds did not come from Trump’s campaign.

Trump’s travel ban is just one of many US policies that legalize discrimination against Muslims

(Credit: Getty/Spencer Platt)

On Jan. 19, a year after President Donald Trump’s first travel ban was issued, the Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments against the latest third version signed by Trump on Sept. 24, 2017. This version remains in full effect.

Under the ban, nationals from eight countries are subject to travel restrictions, varying in severity by country. Venezuela and North Korea are on the list, but the ban overwhelmingly targets Muslim-majority countries: Chad, Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Thus, what the American Civil Liberties Union has called a “Muslim ban” will have tremendous consequences on 150 million people, the majority of whom are Muslim.

This policy did not emerge in a vacuum. In fact, findings from our recently published research expose 15 federal measures and 194 state bills that impact Muslims directly. Here’s a brief overview of some of the most critical yet overlooked measures.

Anti-Muslim federal measures

After Sept. 11, immigration became a key national security issue. As a result, 15 federal programs and initiatives were implemented that target and discriminate against Muslim individuals and communities. These measures rely on a narrative that depicts Muslims as untrustworthy and in conflict with American values. This framing has justified the surveillance, racial profiling and violation of citizens’ rights and protections enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

There are two important, often overlooked measures that have discriminated against Muslims and Arabs: the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System and 2015 changes to the Visa Waiver Program.

The Entry-Exit Registration System, created by the Justice Department in 2002, fingerprinted, photographed and attempted to track all non-citizen males over 16 years of age from 25 countries. With the exception of North Korea, all 25 countries had Muslim-majority populations and more than 85,000 individuals were registered in the system. The surveillance program was implemented as a counter-terrorism tool, but the program resulted in zero terrorism convictions. Although all target countries in the program were removed in 2011, its regulatory framework remained in place for 14 years and could have been reinstituted at any time.

In December 2016, President Barack Obama officially dismantled the program. Obama was motivated, in part, by preventing the incoming Trump administration from reviving the program. One of Trump’s campaign promises was to implement a Muslim registry.

Additional anti-Muslim travel policies were introduced following the November 2015 Paris attacks and the 2015 San Bernardino attack in California.

The attacks spurred changes to the Visa Waiver Program. The waiver allows citizens of specific countries to travel to the U.S. for up to 90 days without a visa. The 2015 changes exempted several Muslim-majority nations including Iran, Iraq, Sudan and Syria from these travel privileges.

Further updates were implemented in 2017 to target citizens of Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen and visitors to those countries.

Anti-Muslim state legislation

In addition to federal measures, our database has documented 194 anti-Sharia bills introduced in 39 state legislatures across the U.S. from 2010 to 2016. The anti-Sharia movement is responsible for the creation of these bills, sponsored by anti-Muslim organizations like ACT for America, and politicians who spread misunderstandings and fears around Sharia. This movement frames Sharia as a cruel and violent set of Islamic laws that are infiltrating U.S. courts to undermine American values and freedoms.

Sharia is a moral code founded on the teachings of the Quran and the Hadith – the teachings and actions of the Prophet Mohammed. Sharia is not the equivalent of Islamic law, but rather outlines how devout Muslims should engage with the world, from what they eat to how they conduct business and personal affairs.

Anti-Sharia bills, founded on the fear of “creeping Sharia,” identify Sharia as “foreign law” and thus ban its use in courts. However, U.S. courts do regularly interpret and apply foreign law, like Sharia, so long as it does not violate the U.S. Constitution.

In states that have banned the use of foreign law, judges are unable to enforce individual contracts that call for the application of Sharia. This restricts Muslims from upholding a range of personal agreements including marriage, estate distribution after death, or awarding of damages in commercial disputes or negligence matters. For example, the Kansas State Legislature enacted anti-Sharia Senate Bill 79 in 2012. Later that year, a woman named Elham Soleimani, a Muslim immigrant from Iran, filed for divorce from her husband. Under the Islamic marriage contract she and her husband had signed, she was due US$677,000 in the event of divorce. The court refused to enforce the agreement, citing the enacted anti-Sharia law.

Anti-Sharia statutes not only fuel public fear around Islam and Muslims, but also prevent Muslims from using Sharia in rulings that call for cultural context.

Surveillance, travel restrictions, and anti-Sharia laws represent the ways in which U.S. policies discriminate against Muslims. As we anticipate the Supreme Court’s decision in June to either uphold or rescind Trump’s travel ban, the question remains: Will the Supreme Court continue to allow the legal discrimination against Muslims in the U.S.?

Basima Sisemore, Researcher, Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society, University of California, Berkeley and Rhonda Itaoui, PhD Candidate and Research Fellow, Western Sydney University