Here are some of the topics that have caught my attention as I’ve been browsing the internet: 

Leading Off

Over the past few years, I have spent considerable time thinking about how large a role luck has in politics and life. 

Fortunes and political achievements are often made—and lost—because of factors outside our control. Yet we often proclaim people as geniuses or failures because of results that had little to do with their innate skill or brilliance. 

Warren Buffett has noted that if he had been born in Bangladesh, his particular set of talents would not have allowed him to become one of the wealthiest people in the world. How many self-proclaimed self-made people started with a few million dollars from their parents or happened to have the right roommate at university? How many talented people did not receive the nurturing needed to foster their abilities because of the zip code in which they were born?

I’m sitting in Silicon Valley as I type this, and while this place has provided more than a few examples of this dynamic over the past few years, you can see it all around the country and the world. 

I am thinking again about luck and fortune this morning because of a thoughtful piece written by James Fallows about his former boss, President Jimmy Carter. Fallows was a speechwriter for Carter before going on to become a successful writer and editor. Fallows explores Carter’s legacy in a piece appropriately headlined “Unlucky President, Lucky Man.” He writes: 

Life is unfair, as a Democratic president once put it. That was John F. Kennedy, at a press conference early in his term.

Jimmy Carter did not go through as extreme a range of the blessings and cruelties of fate as did Kennedy and his family. But I think Carter’s long years in the public eye highlighted a theme of most lives, public and private: the tension between what we plan and what happens. Between the luck that people can make for themselves and the blind chance they cannot foresee or control.

In the decades of weekly Bible classes he led in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, Jimmy Carter must have covered Proverbs 19:21. One contemporary translation of that verse renders it as: “Man proposes, God disposes.”

Not everything in his life happened the way Jimmy Carter proposed or preferred. But he made the very most of the years that God and the fates granted him.

Fallows discusses Carter’s successful life pre-and-post presidency. Many people today think that his presidency was a failure. But, in my experience, a great deal of what people believe to be his failures should more accurately be assigned to bad fortune. As Fallows recaps: 

Despite it all, Carter had broader support during his first year in office than almost any of his successors, except briefly the two Bushes in wartime emergencies. Despite it all, most reckonings have suggested that Carter might well have beaten Ronald Reagan, and held on for a second term, if one more helicopter had been sent on the “Desert One” rescue mission in Iran, or if fewer of the helicopters that were sent had failed. Or if, before that, Teddy Kennedy had not challenged Carter in the Democratic primary. Or if John Anderson had not run as an independent in the general election. What if the ayatollah’s Iranian government had not stonewalled on negotiations to free its U.S. hostages until after Carter had been defeated? What if, what if.

Carter is also unlucky because so many people do not accurately remember what happened in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Rick Pearlstein’s Reaganland, the fourth and final book in his essential history of the rise of conservatism, goes into great detail about the political and cultural history of the time. 

Noah Smith offers a shorter version about a few of the differences between memory and reality in this post: “Much of what you’ve heard about Carter and Reagan is wrong.”

For example, Carter was the one who beat inflation. Carter also did more deregulating than Reagan, for better or worse. (Certainly better if one enjoys a great craft beer.) As Smith writes:

So what do we learn from the misunderstandings surrounding these two Presidents? One lesson, obviously, is that the narratives we tell about history are largely constructed after the fact, by actors who have a stake in painting a certain picture of the recent past. But another is that successful policy takes a long time to work. Carter deregulated, appointed a tough inflation-fighter to the Fed, and funded the USSR’s military opponents. But it wasn’t until the 80s that the economy boomed, inflation came down, and the USSR weakened and fell. In 1980, when Reagan beat Carter for the presidency, it still looked as if nothing was working and everything was still going wrong — even though the crucial policy steps that would turn things around had already been largely taken. (emphasis in original)

Fortune also plays a factor in our lifespans. And, as Fallows explains, the fact that Carter had such a vibrant post-presidency—by far the longest of any president—provided time for him to rewrite some of the narratives about his role in our society. He writes: 

This extended span mattered for reasons within Carter’s control, and beyond it. Good fortune, medical science, and a lifetime history as a trim, fit athlete (he was a good tennis player, a runner, and a skillful softball pitcher), helped Carter survive several bouts of cancer and other tolls of aging. But his faith, will, idealism, and purpose allowed him to invent and exemplify a new role for former presidents, and to see his own years in office reconsidered.

Suppose that, like Lyndon B. Johnson, he had died of a literal and figurative broken heart at age 64. His record and achievements would have concluded with Ronald Reagan still in office, and his story would have been summarized as ending on a loss. Carter could never have received the Nobel Peace Prize, which he won while nearing age 80, in 2002. (Nobel Prizes cannot be given posthumously.)

With health like Lyndon Johnson’s, Jimmy Carter would not have had a chance to establish his new identity—and to see prevailing assessments of his role as president change as profoundly as those of Harry Truman did. As with Truman, the passing years have made it easier to see what Carter achieved, and to recognize what he was trying to do even when unsuccessful. But Truman was no longer alive to see that happen. For Carter I think the process of reassessment will go on.

I hope Fallows is correct about this reassessment. Based on all the accounts I’ve read, Carter was a hard and diligent worker. But his life demonstrates how the events outside our control matter so much to how we remember a person. 

We would do well to keep this more in mind as we celebrate successes today. The best ideas and hardest work ethics can’t always overcome how capricious fate and fortune can be. 

Things I Find Interesting by Craig Cheslog is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

A Doctor Explains How Abortion Bans Actually Work 

The Guardian’s Poppy Noor shares a diary written by Dr. Leilah Zahedi-Spung about what she experienced trying to help patients deal with the real-life ramifications of Tennessee’s total ban on abortion procedures. 

The stories Dr. Zahedi-Spung shares are heartbreaking and terrifying. Here’s one example:

This patient came in around 16 weeks pregnant, having felt a gush of fluid from what’s called a preterm premature rupture of membranes. Her water had broken early. She was with her partner and her mom, having had a totally normal pregnancy up until that point. She was in an incredible amount of pain, contracting every five minutes and crying. The amount of pain indicated she may go into labor soon, too early for the pregnancy to be viable. A heartbeat was still detectable on the ultrasound.

“I figured she’d deliver at some point. But I didn’t know when – and she was certainly not able to be discharged home given the amount of pain she was in. She was not infected; she certainly wasn’t bleeding enough for me to justify doing anything. So we just had to wait, and I made her as comfortable as I could – we gave her an epidural,” says Zahedi-Spung.

If there wasn’t a total ban in place, Zahedi-Spung would have induced labor, or taken the patient to the operating room to perform a surgical abortion. But the rules said she couldn’t.

The patient delivered around 12 hours later, after Zahedi-Spung had gone home.

“Technically we didn’t break any standards of care, but the evidence-based guidelines are that if someone’s water breaks prior to 22 weeks, you end the pregnancy. So I wasn’t doing all that I could have done to protect the patient. Thankfully, she didn’t get sick and she didn’t bleed to death. But why do I have to wait for [that] to take care of people?” asks Zahedi-Spung.

Abortion, Every Day’s Jessica Valenti often emphasizes that we can’t legislate pregnancy. There are just too many complications. This is one of the reasons exceptions laws don’t work—there can’t be enough clarity about what a doctor can or can’t do. As Valenti explains:

That’s why I’ve written about exceptions so many times over. The vast majority of Americans do not realize that abortion ‘exceptions’ are a Republican PR stunt—not something people can actually use. The fact that Democrats aren’t talking about this every single day is unbelievable to me.

I feel the same way. 

Speaking of Valenti’s essential newsletter, she includes in this edition stories about how Walgreens has caved to an intimidation campaign and now won’t distribute abortion medication in Kansas, new legislation in Alabama that would classify abortion as homicide, and how all these abortion bans mean that many medical students and residents are now unable to receive the training they need about essential health care procedures. 

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Quick Pitches

Politics

California Attorney General Rob Bonta has created the first-ever post-conviction justice unit within the California Department of Justice. “The new unit, once fully staffed, will work with broad discretion — in partnership with local district attorneys — to conduct investigations and reviews aimed at resolving wrongful or improper criminal convictions, including matters where there may be evidence of significant integrity issues, and to identify cases that may be suitable for potential resentencing.” We need to do more to help people access the courts in these situations. (California Office of the Attorney General Press Release)

The three leading candidates in the campaign to succeed U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein—Rep. Katie Porter, Rep. Barbara Lee, and Rep. Adam Schiff—agree on most of the issues. Here’s a look at how that dynamic will impact the race. (Seema Mehta, The Los Angeles Times)

Parker Malloy explains how the New York Times seems determined to repeat the mistakes the paper made with the Holocaust with its ongoing anti-trans activism. Yes, I know that we often overuse that comparison. So we should be careful when we do. But I agree with Malloy that it hits the mark in this case. (Parker Malloy, The Present Age)

The election for a state Supreme Court seat in Wisconsin on April 4 could be the most important one of the year. (Dan Moynihan, Can We Still Govern?)

We should be clear that Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s call for a ”national divorce” is just another white supremacist way to disenfranchise Black people. As Noah Berlatsky explains, “Greene’s rant isn’t really intended as a considered case for a second Civil War. Rather, people like her who evoke secession do so as a form of propaganda. Specifically, they are framing partisan division as regional. That allows them to frame themselves as victims under assault by a supposedly more powerful Northern aggressor. And it also allows them to pretend that their ideology and political aspirations are about local control, rather than white supremacy.” (Noah Berlatsky, Public Notice)

Following up on a story I’ve previously shared in this newsletter, a Florida school board has banned three books at the request of a teacher whom numerous students allege of being openly racist and homophobic in class. (Judd Legum, Popular Information)

Because of qualified immunity, the Supreme Court ruled that police did not violate an Ohio man’s constitutional rights when they arrested and prosecuted him for creating a satirical website. (Lawrence Hurley, NBC News) 

And, as Craig Calcaterra writes about this Ohio case, “Stuff like this is probably worth remembering the next time big fans of our current Supreme Court go on and on about their free speech rights. I imagine those types can explain in detail why it’s a violation of their previous freedoms for a private company to ask them not to say hateful things on their platform but that it’s perfectly OK for the state to arrest and imprison you for saying bad things about the cops. It may not make any coherent sense, but I’m sure they can say it.” (Craig Calcaterra, Cup of Coffee)

In many countries, the tax service does most of the job of filling out tax returns. Turbotax hires many lobbyists to keep the United States from following suit. (Cory Doctorow, Pluralistic)

Science

Jupiter and Venus are coming closer and closer together each night until they will be just a half-degree apart on March 4. It is fun to see the noticeable difference each night. (Phil Plait, Bad Astronomy)

An increase in the speed at which the Earth is rotating may require us to experience a negative leap second soon. (Rahul Rao, Popular Science)

Here’s the story about the creation of the Rapatronic, a camera engineer created in order to photograph the first microseconds of a nuclear explosion in the 1950s. (Maverick Baker, InterestingEngineering.com)

Technology

Iphone users are about to get 31 new emoji, including a shaking face that I suspect I will use pretty often. (Sarah Perez, TechCrunch)

My former employers at Common Sense Media are starting a new initiative to help people navigate cybersecurity. They are asking people to complete this online survey as part of this effort. (Common Sense Media)

Society

Calvin and Hobbes creator Bill Watterson is about to release his first major work since 1995. I share the excitement of so many about what we will see in The Mysteries, a “fable for grown-ups.” (Matthew Cantor, The Guardian)

A first-generation iPhone that was still in its unopened box because its owner didn’t want to switch to AT&T from Verizon just sold at auction for $63,356. (John-Anthony Disotto, iMore)

Sports

The New York Mets closed one of their recent spring training sessions to reporters in order to work on secret plays related to the new baserunning rules. Just what is manager Buck Showalter up to that requires these NFL-like practices? (Noah Woodward, The Advance Scout)

The Closer

The CEO of Ukranian Railways shares a Twitter thread about how they helped manage the visit of President Biden to Kyiv and the creation of Rail Force One (while also keeping a 90 percent on-time performance in a war zone). 

So, here is the story of @POTUS‘s visit to #Kyiv and how #RailForceOne was born.

Grab some 🍿, @Amtrak.

Danger: long 🧵 ahead.

— Alexander Kamyshin (@AKamyshin) 9:03 AM ∙ Feb 21, 2023

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Things I Find Interesting by Craig Cheslog is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.