The Week: What Caught Our Eye

April 15, 2023

Welcome back, Milky Way. We’ve missed you. The Milky Way stays below the horizon in winter in the Northern Hemisphere. Its return to the night sky is one of the lesser-known benefits of spring. John Bulmer

Dear Colleagues and Friends:

We don’t seem to agree on much these days, but here’s something to consider on this weekend before your tax returns are due: Most Americans are actually proud to pay their taxes. We see it as a patriotic civic duty, a contribution to the overall good. We like to contribute. A former Marine said paying taxes is “the cost of being an American.” A retired Floridian said it’s the way we take care of each other and the future. One man from Ohio called it a responsibility to “the Founding Fathers.” And the feeling is bipartisan, as is the anger that some other people are not paying their fair share.

Now, things may have changed since Vanessa Williamson published her 2017 study, but at that time the Princeton researcher found that, compared to 14 European countries, Americans report the highest willingness to pay taxes, and the United States has one of the highest rates of tax compliance in the developed world. Maybe it’s because we fear the IRS, but economists  say the high compliance rates are not likely explained solely by the threat of enforcement.

FRESH PERSPECTIVE: As a player, Antonio Brown was, to put it mildly, a challenge to manage. He famously quit on his team, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, two years ago during a game against the Jets. Now that he’s an investor in the Albany Empire, a minor league indoor football team, he’s changing his tune, tweeting, “As an owner I finally see now why it’s important to make everyone know no one is bigger than the Team! As a player I always thought opposite!” Chris Ward of SteelersNow.com writes, “I guess it’s better late than never, but Brown’s unprompted tweet is still pretty ironic, as he was the poster child of narcissism, self-interest and vanity during his NFL career.”

TUPPERSCARE: Tupperware is, like Kleenex, one of those rare brands that is synonymous with a broad category of products, an enviable perch to hold. Take a quick look around your kitchen. Any Tupperware? Of course, there must be some shoved into a bottom drawer, with tops that don’t fit bottoms. Like your plastic containers, Tupperware is in tough shape. From the mid-1940s, it relied on sales through the coffee-and-cookies Tupperware parties hosted by an army of independent dealers. Now, like Avon and other direct-selling brands, Tupperware faces questions about whether it can stay survive the era of online shopping. The company said it is exploring potential layoffs and property sales as it seeks cash to stay afloat. A retail analyst told CNN several issues are hurting Tupperware, including a “sharp decline in the number of sellers, a consumer pullback on home products, and a brand that still does not fully connect with younger consumers. … The company used to be a hotbed of innovation with problem-solving kitchen gadgets, but it has really lost its edge.”

HOME RUN HELPER: It has long been understood that more home runs are hit in warm weather than in cold because of simple physics — warm air is less dense than cold air, meaning there are fewer molecules in the air to provide resistance. But no one had ever tried to assess the effects of climate change on major league home run production, until now. A team of scientists studied a host of data and concluded that more than 500 home runs since 2010 could be directly linked to reduced air densities driven by human-caused global warming.

THE WORLD’S BEST: Some thought they’d seen the best of Mikaela Shiffrin. What an extraordinary early start she had as a young competitive alpine skier. Prodigy, some said. Then came the setbacks, on the slope and in life. She persevered and today, at 27, is the winningest female alpine skier of all time, with a sports announcer proclaiming recently: “The glaciers will melt before anyone else reaches that benchmark.” Shiffrin, who went to school in Vermont and now makes her home in Vail, Colo., has won a record 88 World Cup races. NBC’s Tim Layden profiles her career.

HOW MANY MORE? Six dead in Nashville. Five in Louisville. Four people shot in Washington, D.C, at the funeral of a man who was himself shot to death days earlier. As of mid-April, there have been 145 mass shootings in the United States already in 2023. 

WASHINGTON’S SARATOGA: Not everybody is fond of Saratoga. George Washington, for example. Even though the pivotal 1777 victory of Colonial Gen. Horatio Gates over British Gen. John Burgoyne is said to be the “turning point of the Revolution,” the essential step toward the ultimate American victory and Washington’s elevation to the presidency, Gates’ well-publicized success nearly led to Washington’s ouster as commander in chief. Some colonists clamored for a change in command when Gates’ victory at Saratoga finally led the French, Spanish and the Dutch to support the American effort. Washington survived the political battle, and Gates went on to receive the British surrender at Yorktown in 1781. Writer John Oliver will deliver a presentation April 27 on the history between Washington and Saratoga, “It’s Complicated.”

AT THE GOVERNOR’S TABLE: Former New York Gov. George Pataki and his wife, Libby, have applied to the Adirondack Park Agency to offer a couple cottages at their farm overlooking Lake Champlain for short-term rentals. The cottages are listed on Airbnb, and expected to fetch $300 to $400 a night. The former governor in 2020 called the property “one of the most beautiful places on the planet” and “one of the most undiscovered parts of the whole Northeast.” It’s unclear whether the APA, which regulates development within the boundaries of the Adirondack Park, needs to sign off.

GIVE IT A REST: If you’ve ever driven any distance in New York State, you know about the Thruway, more than 400 miles of tolled interstate that links New York City to Albany and Albany to Buffalo. Drivers pay good money for the privilege of driving on that highway (just ask any trucker you know), and were told a few years ago that 23 new, modernized rest areas were coming at no expense to the taxpayers of New York State. Turns out the company building the spiffy new rest areas wants the state to give them a $260 million bailout to cover cost overruns, even though the company is contractually obligated to cover those costs. In this case, New York State seems inclined to give bailouts a rest.

From the words of poet Jim Yerman: “I love old fences. They remind me of an era, an age that was simple and slow. They are rustic, pastoral, picturesque, and harken to a time long ago.” Nancie Battaglia 

FRAUD ALERT: The FBI is warning people not to use public USB charging stations at airports and hotels and other travel hubs because the docks can be altered to introduce malware or tracking software on whatever device you are charging. The Federal Communications Commissioned issued a similar advisory in 2021, encouraging travelers to use their own chargers and cables or an external battery.

GROW UP: The University at Albany joined a growing list of campuses nationwide where conservative speakers are being shouted down and silenced by protesters who evidently are terrified of having their views challenged. “There is ample video of the Tuesday disruption, of course, and what struck me when watching was the laziness and cowardice of the protesters,” columnist Chris Churchill, hardly anyone’s idea of a right-wing firebrand, wrote in the Albany Times Union. “Standing up before a crowd to deliver a speech requires courage and many hours of preparation. Standing up to challenge a speaker with a tough question also requires a bit of bravery, along with the knowledge needed to hold up one side of the debate. But chanting inane slogans is the easy way out, requiring no daring or backbone. The mentality of the mob is disrespected for good reason. It’s so often dumb.” Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs is taking the issue head on, hosting a symposium this weekend devoted to speech and civil discourse on campus. Administrators at Cornell have also found their spine, rejecting a resolution by the school’s student assembly to require professors to add trigger warnings to their syllabus for class content that could be offensive to students. Who would have thought  Ivy League students are so delicate?

GAMES FOR THE AGES: Baseball is a game of quirks and statistical oddities, and this week certainly delivered. Brady Ware, a graduate transfer at the University of Indianapolis, became the first player in the recorded history of collegiate or pro baseball to pitch a no-hitter and hit for the cycle — single, double, triple and home run — in the same game, adding 11 strikeouts to boot, in a 14-0 win over Drury University. Even more amazing, as part of a doubleheader, it was a seven-inning game. And in the minor leagues, the Class AA Chattanooga Lookouts defeated the Rocket City Trash Pandas 7-5 despite being no-hit, scoring all seven of their runs in the final inning with the help of five walks, four hit batters, a wild pitch and an outfield error.

SUBSCRIPTION MADNESS: Anyone who’s ever subscribed to something online knows just how simple it is to sign up and how grindingly annoying it can be when you try to cancel. No, I don’t want to talk to a customer service rep. Yes, I’m sure. No, I don’t want your discount, I JUST WANT TO CANCEL MAKE IT STOP!!!!! The Federal Trade Commission is trying to do something about that, proposing “click to cancel” rules for recurring subscriptions and memberships. For one frustrated SiriuxXM subscriber, the rules can’t happen fast enough.

SPACE RACE: A museum in Maine is offering a $25,000 reward to the first person who finds and turns in a chunk from a meteorite that fell to Earth last weekend somewhere in a remote stretch of forest near the Canadian border. Darryl Pitt, chair of the meteorite division at the Maine Mineral and Gem Museum in Bethel, told The Associated Press that the unusually bright fireball was visible around noon last Saturday and that witnesses reported hearing sonic booms. He said because the descent was spotted by radar, he’s confident meteorites can be found on the ground.

POTHOLE PATROL: A 2021 report from the American Society of Civil Engineers found the U.S. had a $435 billion dollar road repair backlog. So what’s a municipal public works department to do? For one, said Jo Sias, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of New Hampshire, they should start using future climate projections, rather than past data, when planning paving projects. No longer willing to wait for the city of Los Angeles to fill the crater in his neighborhood, Arnold Schwarzenegger took care of it himself.

HIDDEN TREASURE: The assignment was straightforward: Malo de Lussac, an auctioneer in Paris, was to drive to Northern France to inspect and assess the value of art and other artifacts for a client. As he looked over the artwork adorning the walls of the client’s TV room, he spotted a painting covered in dust and partially hidden by a door. The owner joked that it was a fake, but de Lussac examined it closely, noting the canvas, brushstrokes and colors were all consistent with the work of 17^th century Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel the Younger. The painting, “L’Avocat du village” — or “the Village Lawyer” — just sold at auction for about $850,000.

LIVES

AL JAFEE was a brilliant graphic artist whose back-cover fold-ins for Mad magazine were the stuff of legend, skewering all manner of politicians, media, pop culture and whatever other unlucky targets attracted his satirical gaze. The fold-in itself was satire, an inversion of the pull-out features popular in magazines at the time. It was supposed to be a one-time gag — the first fold-in, in 1964, featured Elizabeth Taylor arm-in-arm with Richard Burton, only to reveal Taylor kissing someone else — but was so popular that it became a staple of the magazine. He was 102.

ALMOST FINAL WORDS

“It was good to be able to face him and say what I wanted to say which, first and foremost, is that I forgive him because holding onto that anger would never help me. Forgiveness is not about forgetting or saying what he did was OK. Forgiveness is about saying I can move forward with my life and let go of the anger.” 
—    Jon Romano, the victim of a vicious sword attack in Albany, N.Y., following remarks he made in court at the sentencing of his attacker. In court, Romano said, “I want you to know that although my life will never be the same, I will move forward and do well. And I wish you well.”

THE SIGNOFF

IT’S A … GIRL?!?: There are few global birth announcements that don’t involve A-list celebrities or royalty, but you’ll understand why Audrey Marie Clark is an exception: She’s the first baby girl born in her west Michigan family since 1885.

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Principal Author: Bill Callen. 

Sincere Thanks to Contributors: Ryan Moore, John Brodt, Lisa Fenwick, Leigh Hornbeck, Troy Burns, Tara Hutchins, Claire P. Tuttle, John Bulmer, Nancie Battaglia and Mark McGuire.

FACING OUT is what we do. We help companies, organizations and individuals work effectively with their most important external audiences – their customers, their shareholders, their communities, the government and the news media.  www.behancommunications.com

Facing Out features news and other nuggets that caught our eye, and that we thought might be of value to you, our friends and business associates. Some items are good news about our clients and friends, others are stories that we hope will leave you a bit more informed or entertained than you were five minutes ago. As always, we welcome your ideas and feedback. 

Let’s make it a conversation: mark.behan@behancom.com