Solving the Illegal Immigrant Problem

By some estimates, there are 20 million illegal immigrants in the United States, a number that grows every day. This is a staggering problem, and one created mostly by Democrats.

And yes, that gets me as hot as the next guy. They don't even try to justify it anymore, they just do it.

But assigning blame doesn't change the need to solve the problem.

So, what is the solution?

Donald Trump has been promoting the idea of deportation, and recent polls support this idea.

But, has anyone thought this through? How would you do it?

It took a long time for us to get 2 million soldiers to Europe in World War II. That was one-tenth the logistical challenge.

A 747 holds 400 people. It would take 50,000 flights to get the job done. There are only 434 747s in the world. 

Requisition Icon of the Seas? 

Buses? Do I even have to do the math?

Then there are the optics. Rounding up illegals, detaining them, forcing them on flights...there would be thousands of videotaped scenes of despair and anguish, of families being rounded up, and the media would be there every time. Democrats would make hay. People who thought they supported deportation would change their minds.

Deportation doesn't work on a logistical level, and it doesn't work on a political level. 

It. Will. Never. Happen.

So, what to do?

Here is a five step plan.

1. Shut down the border. Build a wall. Lean on Mexico. These things aren't hard. The first step is containing the problem and not allowing it to get any bigger.

2. Establish hundreds of regional immigration centers. Anyone here illegally must show up and register within three months. As a country, we need to know who is here and have a way to keep track of them. Those registering will be given some sort of provisional resident alien status. No, they will not be allowed to vote.

3. Anyone caught not registering will be subject to immediate deportation, as will anyone caught breaking our laws. 

4. Equally important, any business employing non-registered aliens will be subject to heavy fines. This will give businesses the incentive to pressure their employees to fall in line.

5. Establish a path to citizenship. This would include a citizenship test (in English). 

Yes, I know it seems like this rewards illegal behavior, but we're better off if we can make them Americans. Remember, they're not going anywhere. The alternative is to be like France, with a permanent, resentful sub-class of non-French.

It will take time to fully absorb 20 million people, but it can be done—both economically and culturally (ditch multiculturalism and bring back the melting pot).

What Democrats have done to put us in this situation is disgraceful, but that doesn't alter the reality. It is an historic mess, and now it's time to put solutions in place.

The Assault on Beauty

 

Recently, New York declared an annual "Fat Beach Day."

It was a day when "plus size" people were encouraged to hang out at the beach, proud and unafraid.

Apparently, the idea is spreading (although, if my recent forays to the beach are any indication, every day is plus size day).

One of the organizers described it thus: 

"We're going through something culturally that is impacting us every day on an individual level and a systemic level."

That clear it up for you? (Gosh, these people love the word "systemic.")

Elsewhere, Dove USA, whose principle product is the "Beauty Bar," hired this woman to be a brand ambassador:

Hey, body positivity, people!

And then there are those ubiquitous Gatorade ads...

I could go on but I know I don't have to. We are being told by people who matter that we shouldn't be judgmental about beauty.

At this point, let me state this: I am aware of the old saw, "beauty is in the eyes of the beholder."

But is it, really? Are there no objective standards of beauty, things we can agree on? I think there are, or at least have been. Like this, for instance:

Can we agree that Cindy Crawford is beautiful? And before you say anything, I know that standards of beauty change over time. But I submit if Rubens were alive today he'd be reaching for a damn Pepsi.

This rant, though, is not just about the female form. It's far broader than that. There is an assault on beauty today that is both broad-based and, I believe, ideological.

I'll get to that second part. First, let's see how broad-based this is

How about architecture? 

This is the Boston Public Library. The Renaissance Revival structure, built in the late 19th century, was once described as a "Palace for the People."

Beautiful, no?

Now consider the library's more recent addition, glued right on to the back...

F**king ugly, right? A Brutalist eyesore. (If you disagree, I don't want to know you.) 

But wait, Scott, it was designed by Philip Johnson, and he's such an important architect. We all study him in architecture school! Don't be such a Philistine!

Suck it. I don't want to go to your boring dinner parties anyway. I'd probably bring you a lousy bottle of wine and use the wrong fork.

So, how about art?

Can we agree that this is beautiful?

Or, a few centuries later, this?

Now what about this?

But, Scott, that's a Motherwell, and he's sooo important!

I don't care. It's ugly, and I question how much talent or practice it took to paint it. Imagine if Motherwell had been asked to paint the Sistine Chapel.

A more recent trend is called "vomit art," which is exactly that. Here's a practitioner, hard at work:

How about something mundane, like a drinking fountain? Once, our cities designed them like this...

Now, you're more likely to see this...

How about something as simple as a lamp post? I give you lamp posts, yesterday and today.

(Courtesy of the Culture Critic on X.)

And music! In a single generation we have gone from the sublime craftsmanship of Sgt. Peppers and the aching timelessness of God Only Knows to rap music, deconstructed to the point having no melody, harmony, or discernible connection to actual music at all.

We are a society that has decoded the human genome, explored Mars, and can make a pizza arrive at your door in ten minutes. We do great things!

So, why have we turned our back on beauty? What the heck is going on?

Well, something is going on, and if you're guessing it's not a good thing, you'd be correct.

It is a part of a larger assault on Western society, traditions, and culture.

If you are a loyal Naked Dollar reader, you know I've written about critical theory, cultural Marxism, and perpetual protest culture. One of the key takeaways is that it's never about the nominal thing (black lives, trans rights, climate, Gaza...).

The people marching in their daily protests know virtually nothing about any of the underlying issues. The animating force is a hatred of God and Country, something bred in them at our schools. It's a desire to tear down our country, because, after all, why should we have it so good?

Much of this stems from the nihilistic teachings of our intellectual class, critical theory in particular. Critical theory informs us that there's no such thing as absolute truth, that truth is just a fairy tale concocted by those with power.

This intellectual virus spread, giving everyone permission to dismiss the vast inheritance of Western Civilization and its tenets like the Enlightenment, those things merely being the social constructs of the Dead White Europeans who had power back whenever.

All laws, traditions, and institutions stemming from those times needed to be torn down.

What's occurring in the aesthetic realm is no different. Standards of beauty are constructs of the old ways, just another means of oppression. How dare you insist that an artist spend years leaning a craft when the downtrodden—the other— don't have the resources?

Why, any application of paint (or vomit) to canvas is equally valid!

Call it Critical Aesthetic Theory, or perhaps just, "Critical Aesthetics."

Who are you to judge what's beautiful? You and your classical art and your Cindy Crawford are just relics of the old order, and you don't get to decide what's beautiful anymore. In fact, we reject the entire idea of beauty! If we accept that some things are beautiful, we are implicitly saying other things aren't.

No! 

My 300-pound body is beautiful, and if you say otherwise, you are a vile member of the oppressor class—and you know what we do to them these days.

Worse still, there is an historical connection between beauty and religion. Beauty, as manifested in art or architecture, was understood to be a way of apprehending the divine. The great cathedrals, for instance, reached purposefully for the heavens.

                                                   Chartres

Art was meant to reassure us that while perfection may not be attainable in this life, it would be in the next.

                                            The Birth of Venus

But of all the institutions worthy of Ivy League contempt, surely none rank higher than the church and formalized religion. If traditional attitudes towards beauty have anything to do with those things, well, you know...ick.

Are purveyors of our aesthetic decline self aware? Do vomit artists or Madison Avenue advertising suits think, consciously, I am trying to tear down Western Civilization?

For the most part, no. Like the students setting up little Hamas tent villages, they are the useful idiots, coasting along where the culture takes them.

But there are people driving that culture, from the professoriate at our most elite universities to the radicals running some of our most prestigious NGOs (see: Ford Foundation). These places are the font of the evil philosophies that are polluting our minds.

Should you, dear reader, support any of these institutions, stop. Just stop. If you're on a board, quit, and tell them why. Or, better, stay and raise your hand to the lunacy.

Now, this grumpy white man is going to turn on the radio and find the classic rock station.

It's Not About Gaza

Near the beginning of my book, Campusland, there is the following scene. It takes place as the president of "Devon University" (located in "Havenport," Connecticut—draw your own conclusions) approaches the building that houses his office:

A small knot of protesters were gathered outside the entrance. It was early in the year for that sort of thing, but having spent the last several decades at Devon, Milton Strauss was more than used to it. He even had sympathy for most of the causes, having himself slept several nights in a shanytown that progressives had constructed during the dark days of apartheid. That had been right there, in the stone expanse of Bingham Plaza. What could they be protesting today? No doubt something well-intentioned.

The protesters spotted Milton and instantly became animated. "Hey, Milton, divest from Israel now! Stop the murder! cried one. "Divest now! Divest now!" Their homemade signs thrust up and down like pistons.

Milton smiled and walked over. "It's great to see everyone. Really great." He began shaking hands, much to the bewilderment of the protesters. "Keep up the good work and welcome back to school!"

Then Milton Strauss, the seventeenth president of Devon University, disappeared into Stockbridge Hall.

Campusland came out in 2019, and I probably wrote those words in 2017 or 2018. In the book, the progressive students are disappointed at their lack of traction with the Israel issue, so they readily move on to something else.

In the real world, they wouldn't have to wait long.

I have been told, many times, that Campusland was "prescient."

It wasn't.

I was just paying more attention than most to what was happening on our campuses for many years, right in front of our eyes. Interestingly, there were a few critics of Campusland that accused the satire of being "over the top."

In reality, I dialed the real world back. There were things happening that were so out there, even then, that I decided no one would buy it, even in the form of a satiric novel.

And now here we are, only a couple of years later, and Campusland seems almost tame, particularly as the anti-semitism that pervades academia has risen to the surface.

In the novel, the fecklessness of Milton Strauss and his inability to impose any sort of discipline on his campus, gives rise to chaos.

Sound familiar?

In fact, it is the Milton Strausses of the world, and more particularly the boards that oversee them, that are the targets of my next novel, All the Lovely People (St. Martins Press, due out next spring).

But that's not really the point I want to make today.

What's going on at Columbia, and Yale, and Harvard, and just about everywhere has nothing to do with Gaza. As many have pointed out, most of the protesters couldn't find Gaza on a map. 

I was amused when one journalist approached a student who was chanting, "From the river to the sea..." and asked her exactly what river and sea she was talking about.

Of course, she had no idea.

But this underscores the point I want to make: it's not about Gaza.

Have you noticed that in a mere three years, the animating force behind the street-marching left has morphed from "black lives matter" to "trans rights" and now to "Gaza?"

It wasn't about black lives or trans people then, and it's not about Gaza today. Tomorrow, it will be something else. A bit further back, it was Occupy Wall Street. Does anyone think that was really about the failure of structured mortgage products?

No!

This is about one thing: the tearing down of America, the destruction of our traditions, institutions, and laws. Obama called it the "fundamental transformation of America."

He wasn't kidding.

And it's all the same people, over and over. Their animating influence is a hatred for the very country they live in.

At the heart of this is the radicalization of our education system, all the way down to kindergarten, with DEI at its core. It produces scores of fresh troops for the Movement each and every year.

I have written about this many times, and don't need to make the point again here.

But none of this stops until schools and universities are completely rebooted. If you're giving money, STOP. If you're serving on a board, raise your hand and say WTF! If you're dying for your kid to get into Yale, open your eyes.

Don't sit on your hands and hope others will do the heavy lifting for you.

They won't.

How Now, Democrats?

 

I don't blog about something unless I have something that is (hopefully) original to say, which is why I don't blog a lot. In the world of contemporary politics, especially, it is very difficult to have an original thought. There are literally thousands of pundits out there.

Today, I have an original thought. (At least, I think it is. I don't read everything.) I'll get to that thought in a moment.

This was a remarkable week in Washington as the left and the media were shocked, shocked to discover what all of us already knew, that Joe Biden is a few fries short of a Happy Meal. 

Actually, they did know. Of course they did. The shock was that their own Justice Department said the quiet part out loud. Merrick, you idiot, don't you read these things before they go out? 

My guess is, the conversation went like this:

Garland: So, there are no charges against the president, right?

Special Counsel Hur: Yes, sir.

Garland: Good job Ben—I mean Robert. Release the report.

Garland probably threw up on his shoes when he heard the details later. The half-life of Robert Hur's career can now be measured in nanoseconds.

These events have elevated the "Joe" problem to Defcon One. Various solutions include invoking the 25th Amendment, but that would result in...Kamala. 

You see, it isn't just "what do we do about Joe?" it's also "what do we do about Kamala?"

There's so much hand wringing in Democrat circles that I hear the Beltway has run out of salve. Things would be so much easier if she weren't around. They could just slide in the next guy (or non-binary person, or whatever). 

But Kamala cannot be simply disappeared. The woke wing would throw a tantrum befitting of their juvenile status.

So, while I am loathe to ever make suggestions to help the Democrats, the answer to their problems is one I haven't heard. It involves the following steps:

1. Joe steps down for health reasons sometime around the convention. Dr. Dr. Dr. Jill will have to be talked into this, of course, but at this point things are so bad I believe it could happen.
2. Gavin Newsom rides in as the party's savior at the convention. Democrats and the media rally around Newsom in all the excitement. The weight of having to make excuses for "Old Joe" is off their backs. Note that Newsom deftly manages to avoid the scrutiny of a primary season—an important step, given that his record in California is indefensible.
3. Here's the lynchpin: Because Biden resigned instead of riding things out till January, Kamala gets to be president for a few months. This is her payoff. She'll be the first blah, blah, blah. Picture on stamps, statues, children's books on the presidents. Giant speaking fees and book deals later. No one could take it away from her. 

Step three is what I hear no one discussing and it's the only answer to "what to do" about Kamala. She's an idiot and cannot be allowed near the Supreme Court (despite the precedent for idiots already having been set with Sotomayor). She's already been a senator and no need to get Adam Schiff pissed. 

The Dems will figure that they can hide her at Camp David for a few months, trot her out for a few speeches, and maybe keep her finger away from the button. They certainly won't let her near the Newsom campaign.

This is a very dangerous scenario for the GOP because Newsom is a dangerous man. He can lie to your face and you know he's lying, he knows he's lying, but those teeth! That hair! They all lie, so we might as well have a charming liar, right?

Anyway, tell me I'm wrong.

The Academy of Rot

 

The Smug Patrol

I wasn't making it up. None of it. After screaming into the void for so long, others are seeing the light.

What the hell took them so long?

Whatever. Welcome to the party.

The catalyst, of course, was the evisceration of three university presidents at the hands of Elise Stefanik (Harvard '06). I cannot recall another time when congressional testimony was so self-damaging. (The tobacco companies in the 80s maybe?)

But this, this was incredible, the sight of these three women, self-immolating right in front of us, smirking all the while.

I don't need to add any commentary to what's already been said of the three, other than to point out that Harvard's Gay has now also been accused of plagiarism, academia's mortal sin. If true, will even that be enough to get the highly intersectional Gay fired? 

Harvard's board is run by Penny Pritzker, of the odious Pritzker family, who are much of the hard cash behind the trans rights movement. Don't expect her to put Gay's head on a spike.

Several hundred Harvard faculty have signed a letter supporting Gay, citing how critical the university's "independence" is. Yeah, get back to me when you don't accept $625 million a year of U.S. taxpayer money, not to mention hundreds of millions more from dodgy foreign sources.

My money's on cowardice, always a safe bet when it comes to university boards. The Harvard board meets today.

I have been blogging, writing, and giving speeches about the ideological cesspools that schools have become for, well, decades now. Yale has been my most frequent target. President Peter Salovey, a de facto character in my novel Campusland, must be thanking his lucky stars that he decided to retire this year. Brilliant timing, Pete!

But really, where has everyone been? The evidence has been right there for all to see for years. 

For what it's worth, when I got out of Yale in the 80s, I loved the place, and I still do—that Yale, the one I went to. It was an incredible experience. Was it liberal? Sure, but I never felt like I had to hide what I thought about anything. Plenty of my friends were liberal, and still are. Pretty sure all my professors were liberal, but they didn't punish you for being something else.

Everyone got along. We argued, then we drank beer. Sometimes we did both at the same time. And sometime we just skipped the parts that didn't involve beer.

That Yale is no more. I wrote my last check fifteen years ago, and then actively campaigned to get others to stop, too.

But, but...there were always the kids, your kids, the ones you wanted to go, because you thought they could go to your Yale, or your Harvard. 

You had misgivings, and they increased over the years, but you were still in thrall to the place it was. You kept writing those checks.

What you didn't get was that your kids couldn't go to your Yale or your Harvard or wherever, because it wasn't there. It hadn't been for years. Sure, those campuses were prettier than ever, and those Potemkin Village they set up for you at reunions were always nice, but they hid nothing but rot.

The fantasy dies hard. 

The checks kept getting signed.

The funny part is, few could write checks big enough. You labored under the impression that your $50,000 check was getting Scooter in.

Wrong. The number these days is $20 million, at least at Yale. (It takes a lot to move the needle of a $42 billion endowment.)

So, while I am glad that the likes of Bill Ackman have woken up, I still have to ask: where the f**k have you been? Did it really take murdered Jewish babies to open your eyes?

Apparently.

By the way, there currently exists a HUGE market opportunity for any college that wants to revert to being, well, normal. Eliminate all your "studies" departments, fire your entire DEI and Title IX staffs, enforce free speech and discipline violators. 

This isn't hard. 

You'll probably have to put up with some loud protests, but know that's just a sign you're doing the right thing. You'll also have to stop taking federal money, but think how much you'll save firing all those administrators.

Do these things and you will stand apart from all the rest. There is a significant portion of the population dying for this. Money and applications will flow like a river.

I'm dropping another chapter of my new book here, All the Lovely People. This one feels especially appropriate.

Read on if you're interested.

(Note: All the Lovely People is not out yet. I have just submitted it to St. Martin's Press.)

Yale Could Be a Reach

 

“We’re having trouble with the essay.”

“William means Ginny is having trouble, Ms. Collins,” said Ellie.

“Of course. And please, call me Faith.”

 Faith Collins was Lenox Hill’s longtime college counselor. Padma was also in attendance, which wasn’t typical, but board members were always handled with care. This consideration pleased William.

“Yes, well, they all expect you to write about some terrific adversity you’ve overcome,” continued William. “What’s Ginny supposed to say, that she had trouble skiing the back bowls?”

 “What William is trying to say, Faith, is that while we’re proud we’ve been able to give our daughters a good life, it now seems like a liability we need to apologize for.”

“Oh no, of course not.”

This was an increasingly common source of angst, Faith knew; the challenge of growing up in a life without challenges. Most Lenox girls took for granted the kind of privilege that few in the world could even imagine. Most had second, even third, homes. Private jets were common. 

“I mean look at this,” said William, handing some papers over to Faith. “How are we supposed to deal with this?” 

It was a printout of the Yale application. William had highlighted an essay question which read

 

The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, something that really forced you out of your comfort zone. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

 

Both Padma and Faith knew this was a question, in one form or another, on almost every college application. In 2023, the Supreme Court outlawed affirmative action in the famous Harvard case, but left the door open a crack by allowing universities to consider candidates’ “life experiences.” This left admissions departments to decide for themselves just what constituted life experiences they were interested in. For many, this meant soliciting personal tales of victimization at the hands of a discriminatory culture. Affluent white applicants gainfully tried what they could, documenting every mildly unpleasant interlude in their own short lives, real or imagined. 

This approach was of little use to the Sandersons. 

“Our consultant says to write some nonsense about when Ginny’s aunt died, but Ginny hardly knew her,” said William.

Faith winced at the reference to an outside consultant. College counseling was her job, but increasingly parents were hiring expensive outsiders as well, ones who promised the moon and seldom delivered. 

“We hear they’re going test optional,” said William. “Ginny got a…what was it, Ellie?”

“A 1520.”

 “But now, what? It doesn’t matter?”

“Will, I’m sure it matters,” said Ellie.

“I think I know what’s going on,” continued William. “Get rid of objective standards and it frees schools up to pick kids just on their personal narratives. Am I wrong?”

He was not, thought Padma, but she could hardly say so, nor could she admit she was entirely in favor of the shift in policy. “I think it’s fair to say that colleges are just trying to do what we here at Lenox Hill have done, which is to make opportunities available to a wider set of applicants,” she said.

“And we’re all for that. We all value diversity. But I’d also like my daughter to get into Yale.”

“Well, about that…” said Faith. 

Here it comes, thought Padma. She was perfectly willing to let Faith be the heavy. William Sanderson needed to be managed. Truth be told, she was kind of looking forward to it. 

“We’ve been actively talking to the admissions people up there,” said Faith. “You should know it’s going to be a tough year.”

“Ellie, in case you don’t speak college counselor, that’s code for bend over in the shower and open your wallet.”

“I’m sure Padma and Faith are doing their best,” said Ellie, disquieted by William’s aggressive posture. It wasn’t like him.

“William, Ellie, you are both highly valued members of the Lenox community, and you’ve been quite generous” said Padma. “I should ask, though. Is Yale officially Ginny’s first choice? She hasn’t shared that with us.”

“It…will be,” said William. 

“Honestly,” interjected Ellie, “my own view is that there are lots of places she could be happy. The Ivies aren’t the only schools that offer a good education.” William looked at her like she had two heads. “But Ginny’s our daughter and if she decides on Yale than that’s what I’ll support. It’s her decision.”

“Of…course,” said Padma. “And we’ll do what we can.”

“When did this process become such an ordeal?” said William. “I don’t remember this from my day at all.”

“It’s true, things have evolved,” said Padma, trying to project a warmth she decidedly didn’t feel. “This process can be as stressful for parents as it is for the kids. Sometimes even more so.”

“Ginny’s great-grandfather was Class of ’38. She’s fourth generation.”

“Yes, we know, and Ginny is a wonderful applicant. But these matters of legacy, well, they just don’t carry the weight they used to.”

“So, for the sake of argument, what’s the number?”

Padma, of course, knew what William meant, but decided to play dumb, even though she’d specifically prepared for this moment. The cynicism of the conversation carved tiny pieces out of her soul. “The number?” she asked.

“Yes, the number. What are they looking for in New Haven to make this happen?”

“Ah, I see. Well, they did suggest certain levels of support that would be warmly received.”

“And they are?”

“Five million would—“

“You’re kidding,” said William.

“Five million will get a candidate’s folder a serious second look.”

“A second look? What does that even mean?”

“It’s somewhat ambiguous, deliberately so, but it definitely improves one’s visibility. In our experience it means that an applicant’s folder will get read twice.”

“How nice,” said William. “Five million for an extra five minutes of their time. A million dollars a minute. New York law firms have nothing on the Yale Admissions Department!” 

William now felt decidedly stupid for the apparently meaningless $10,000 gifts he’d been making annually to Yale for years, thinking he was paving the way. Last year, he’d upped it to $25,000. 

“What’s the real number?” he asked.

“Excuse me, but what happened to merit?” asked Ellie. “Shouldn’t Ginny’s record count for itself?”

“It’s more complicated than that,” said Padma. “And remember, we don’t have complete transparency. Yale will do what Yale will do. It’s fair to say that priorities have…evolved.”

But money still talks, thought William. He recalled how one wag called Ivy League universities “hedge funds with schools attached.” They were nothing if not effective fundraising machines. “Which brings me back to my original question. The number. For the sake of argument, what are they actually getting these days?” 

“I don’t know that they like to get too specific about these things, but the number twenty million did come up. If you want to remove as much uncertainty as possible, that’s the number.”

“Those greedy sons of bitches.”

“And usually admittance in those circumstances involves taking a gap year so the applicant doesn’t get counted in the official U.S. News data. They call it the Z-list.”

“William,” said Ellie. “You can’t possibly consider this.”

“Well, there’s always another way to play it, El,” said William. “I think you know what I mean.”

“No,” said Ellie. “We’re not going there, either. This should be based on merit.”

“But you just heard that it’s not. I don’t know why you have to be so stubborn about it.”

“Is there something we should know?” asked Padma.

“It’s nothing,” said Ellie. “I apologize.”

“Then we’re back to money,” said William.

“Or maybe Ginny goes somewhere else?” said Ellie. “There are lots of good schools out there. I’m hearing wonderful things about SMU, and there’s Michigan, or maybe somewhere smaller like Middlebury.”

“Sandersons always—“

“Go to Yale, I know, but, for God’s sake, William.”

“There’s an easier way, Ellie, and you know it.”

“No,” said Ellie.

Padma wondered what William could possibly mean.

“If it’s helpful,” said Faith, chiming in, “the Yale pledge can be paid in installments.”

“How nice of them,” said William. 

 

Of all the facets of her job, dealing with parents like William Sanderson was the one Padma hated the most. She had seen his type many times, men who think things should be given to them by the simple fact of their existence. Men who drifted upward by virtue of their birth. 

When Sanderson’s name was floated for the board, she had done some research. His firm, Bedrock, loudly trumpeted its “values,” but many on the left felt it was a cynical ploy, and that their commitment was skin deep. Sanderson dutifully parroted those values in the media, appearing frequently on Bloomberg and CNBC, but Padma’s instincts told her that Sanderson’s own commitment to those values was entirely situational.

She had quietly lobbied to keep him off the board, but Sanderson’s half million dollar pledge to the capital campaign secured his spot. His saving grace, though, was that he was a coward. That was Padma’s take having watched him the last year or so. This made him pliant, at least on matters that didn’t concern fucking Yale. 

Sandersons go to Yale. My God, was it possible to be any more entitled? Spending precious political capital to get Ginny Sanderson into Yale was not on Padma’s list of professional priorities. The path had been cleared for the Ginnys of the world for far too long. 

But Sanderson was on the board, a board she had to occasionally placate. Or act like it, anyway.

The thought amused her. The board really had nothing to do with running the school. For the most part, all she had to do was attend quarterly meetings and tell them how well everything was going and what a special place Lenox was and how special the girls were. If there were aspects that weren’t special—and there always were—they really didn’t want to hear about it anyway. People like William Sanderson didn’t serve on school boards to solve problems or do any actual work.

So, for the most part, the Lenox board served Padma’s purposes. Sanderson and the others gave her a wide latitude to run things as she saw fit, assuming they were any paying attention at all. And Padma knew why, too. The school held the ultimate trump card, the one William Sanderson was pushing so hard on: college recommendations. 

Parents never saw the final letters. They were enormously important because they couldn’t be gamed or fabricated or bought like so much else in the college process. And at Lenox, all recommendations had to be personally approved by her. She had seen to that. A simple tweak of an adjective or two could sink an Ivy applicant. “Brilliant” became “intelligent,” or “outstanding” became “above average.”

Padma had also tightened up the language in the parent contract, giving her the power to banish problematic families like the Ellisons. That got approved in a single email to Duncan with the proposed contract attached. She doubted he even opened it. No doubt the fate of the Ellisons had sent shivers through the community.

And so, they all danced to her tune.

But her meeting with Sanderson really stuck in her craw. Sure, board members expected preferential treatment, and they usually got it. That’s the way things had worked for generations. But Padma didn’t like William Sanderson, not one bit. If ever there was an embodiment of the WASP old boy network, it was he. There were others out there, others like Barbara Selkirk, who would do more than just warm a board seat and look the other way. They would join her in the fight.

She would bide her time. Barbara had already recommended a few names and Padma was smart, certainly smarter than Sanderson. Perhaps an opportunity would present itself to put things right. What kind of opportunity? She wasn’t sure, but she’d know it when she saw it.

The Sandersons had taken up enough of her time, so Padma went online to check the Sentinel. Padma almost never read the Sentinel, considering the paper to be a reckless purveyor of alt-right propaganda. But right now, it served her purposes. 

And there it was, Dina’s article.

New Chapter

 You've probably noticed I haven't posted anything lately. That's because I've been hard at work on my new novel,  All the Lovely People.

I'm almost done!

For grins, here's another sample chapter:

Dina Campbell stared at her laptop, willing the ideas to come. A weekly deadline didn’t seem too onerous to an outsider, but it crept up on you like a silent cat. 

Her specialty was longer-form features, mostly on city culture, which the Daily Sentinel ran every Sunday in its expanded edition. She was expected to come up with something fresh each week. God, it was so much harder than people thought.

Perhaps another glass of chardonnay. 

She walked to her refrigerator, which was mostly empty. Some leftover condiments, and several bottles of budget wine, and some leftover Chinese takeout; the cliched refrigerator items of any single New Yorker. Home was a small one bedroom on the Upper West Side, so it wasn’t a long walk. Filling her glass two-thirds of the way she then returned to her desk, now occupied by her rescue cat, Ruth, named for one of her personal icons. She shooed her off. Why she got the thing, she still didn’t know. She didn’t even like cats.

Dina was working on a piece about climate-conscious food choices, but knew it was journalistic piffle. (Vegan, basically.) It lacked edge. Staring out the window didn’t help much either. Once, she could just make out part of the Hudson River between two other buildings. Now, she looked about twenty feet into a brick wall. Somehow a developer bought the air rights, and her view was now of the backside of a condo tower. Her apartment was rent controlled, though, and she could never leave, even if she could afford to.

The wine made her maudlin. 

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Once, she’d been a rising star, a wunderkind fresh from the Crimson, her ticket stamped for journalistic glory. She got hired by the Times and sent to their Paris desk, a plum post. There, while covering other assignments, she met some Muslims, the North African ones who lived in the notorious estates. She painstakingly cultivated the relationships, earning their trust, sensing it would pay off. 

She saw they were a community adrift, allowed to live in France, but never be allowed to be French. France bitterly held on to its cultural self-image and American notions of a “melting pot” were not welcomed there. Post 9-11, she could feel tensions rising as the police turned a sharp eye towards the Muslim populace, or in some cases, did the opposite, and allowed estates to virtually self-govern, looking the other way as they adopted Sharia law.

In the sweltering summer of 2005, things boiled over. Police, responding to a theft report, arrived to arrest several Muslim boys who may or may not have been responsible. Two of the boys tried to hide in a nearby power substation and were electrocuted. The electrocution caused a wide power outage which, combined with the news of the boys’ deaths, sparked widespread rioting. One group attacked a police station, forcing an evacuation. The subsequent occupation of the station lasted over two weeks.

The occupiers decided they wanted someone to tell their side of the story, and, through their network, they reached out to Dina. She was invited to the station and ended up embedded there for the duration. Her daily dispatches were dictated over her phone as all power to the station remained shut. It made her feel like a war correspondent.

The series, appearing under her byline, won wide notice for its compassionate portrayal of a desperate generation of young Muslims who saw no future for themselves. It scored her a Front Page Award, awarded to achievement by women in journalism.

If she was giving an honest account of things, it was that moment, that exact moment, when she flew to New York and rose to the podium to accept her award, that was a high water mark after which began a slow, almost imperceptible slide to her current station, writing for a tabloid from a cramped one bedroom. The Times, cutting back like everyone else on international coverage, let her go in a year after the award. Americans were too insular, and frankly too stupid, her editor told her, to care about what happens in France or Yemen or Indonesia.

After Paris, Dina moved around the globe with the wire services, accepting diminished assignments in different posts. It had the patina of glamour, but also made it impossible to keep relationships. She had dated a series of men over the years, most from her own profession. They tended to be rakes and far too impressed with themselves. There was an Al Jezeera correspondent with a fetish for mild bondage and later a CNN anchor whose amorous attentions could only be consummated while watching tapes of himself. That one had lasted a few months. 

Perhaps more than anything, the pay was a source of resentment. This was not a journalistic phenomenon limited to Dina, of course. The rise of the internet also gave rise to thousands of news sources, most of them free. This led to a steady decline in compensation for the entire industry, at least relative to other professions. That there was still a constant supply of over-educated Ivy League trust fund brats willing to work for next-to-nothing didn’t help.

The worst part, for Dina, was tracking the careers of her Harvard classmates, particularly the ones she considered idiots, those eating club swells. Many had pursued investment banking or private equity and were making millions, and for what? Moving money around? Others had gone into law. She’d once respected that cadre somewhat more; they’d gone to law school with high ideals. But then they ended up at Skadden or Cravath or Simpson Thatcher just doing the bidding of the bankers—and still making millions, although perhaps a few less.

Many had houses in the Hamptons and Dina burned with resentment that she would never be more than a weekend guest, deposited there on an overcrowded Jitney because she didn’t own a car.

Dina’s salary from the Sentinel was $90,000. $91,250, to be exact. She’d gone to Harvard, and here she was, the wrong side of forty, making ninety-one thousand and two hundred and fifty goddamn dollars. Surviving in New York on that was next to impossible. Her banker classmates could take that free market bullshit they spouted and shove it out their asses because it clearly wasn’t rewarding intelligence the way it should.

Dina looked down from the brick wall and noticed her wine glass was empty. She got up to take the six steps necessary to get back to the kitchenette. Perhaps inspiration would be found there. At age forty-eight, it felt like it was all just slipping by. She needed something to rescue her from the bitterness that was becoming all-consuming.

She needed a story.

A big one.