The Flight of the Flying Lion: Blake Griffin Officially Retires from the NBA
For over a decade, the NBA was defined by a specific brand of high-flying, rim-rattling athleticism that felt more like performance art than professional basketball. At the center of that movement was Blake Griffin, the powerhouse forward whose dunks became a nightly ritual for millions of fans. On April 16, 2024, Griffin officially closed the curtain on his illustrious 14-year career, announcing his retirement via a heartfelt social media post that reflected on his journey from a standout Oklahoma collegiate star to a global basketball icon.
The Rise of a Hometown Hero
Griffin’s journey to the NBA was rooted in the heart of Oklahoma. After a dominant high school career alongside his brother Taylor, he chose to stay home and play for the University of Oklahoma. His sophomore season in 2008-09 remains one of the most statistically impressive campaigns in college basketball history. Griffin averaged 22.7 points and 14.4 rebounds per game, earning nearly every major National Player of the Year award and leading the Sooners to the Elite Eight.
His performance made him the undisputed No. 1 overall pick in the 2009 NBA Draft by the Los Angeles Clippers. However, his professional start was delayed by a devastating knee injury during his final preseason game, forcing him to miss what would have been his actual rookie year. When he finally debuted in the 2010-11 season, he proved the wait was worth it. Griffin averaged 22.5 points and 12.1 rebounds, becoming the first rookie since Arvydas Sabonis to make the All-Star team and the first since Tim Duncan to be named an All-Star in his debut season. He unanimously won Rookie of the Year, signaling the arrival of a new superstar in Los Angeles.
The Era of Lob City
Before Blake Griffin’s arrival, the Los Angeles Clippers were often viewed as the "second-class citizens" of the Staples Center, living in the long shadow of the Lakers. Griffin’s presence changed the franchise's trajectory and cultural relevance. Following the 2011 trade for Chris Paul and the emergence of DeAndre Jordan, the "Lob City" era was born.
During this period, the Clippers became the most entertaining ticket in sports. Griffin was the primary aerial threat, turning fast breaks into viral highlights. His 2011 Slam Dunk Contest victory—where he famously leaped over a Kia sedan—solidified his status as a cultural phenomenon. Yet, reducing Griffin to just a "dunker" does a disservice to his evolution. During his peak with the Clippers, he finished third in the 2013-14 MVP voting, showcasing an improving mid-range jumper, elite passing for his position, and high-level ball-handling skills.
Resilience in Detroit and Brooklyn
In 2018, the Clippers made the shocking decision to trade Griffin to the Detroit Pistons, just months after he had signed a massive contract extension. Many expected Griffin to fade into obscurity on a rebuilding team, but he instead delivered one of the most gritty and professional stretches of his career. In the 2018-19 season, Griffin transformed his game to accommodate his aging knees, becoming a point-forward who hit a career-high 189 three-pointers and dragged a limited Detroit roster to the playoffs.
His performance in that 2019 playoff series against the Milwaukee Bucks—playing through a significant knee injury that required heavy wrapping and eventually surgery—endeared him to Detroit fans forever. It was a testament to his toughness, proving he was willing to sacrifice his body for the game.
As his athleticism waned, Griffin transitioned into a valuable role player. He joined the Brooklyn Nets in 2021, providing veteran leadership and defensive hustle for a championship-contending team. His final season was spent with the Boston Celtics in 2022-23, where he became a beloved locker-room presence, often referred to as "the glue" of the team. Even when he wasn't playing heavy minutes, his championship pursuit and mentorship were highly valued by his peers.
A Legacy in Perspective
Blake Griffin retires as a six-time All-Star and a five-time All-NBA selection. He finishes his career with averages of 19.0 points, 8.0 rebounds, and 4.0 assists per game—numbers that reflect his versatility. But Griffin’s impact is measured in more than just box scores. He helped revive a dead franchise in Los Angeles, inspired a generation of Oklahomans to pick up a basketball, and showed the world how to reinvent oneself when life (or injury) demands it.
In his retirement announcement, Griffin was characteristically humble. "I’m thankful for every single moment—the good, the bad, the injuries, the wins, the losses, the friends, the family, the people who doubted me, the people who supported me," he wrote. He acknowledged that he wasn't looking for a "farewell tour," but rather a quiet transition to the next chapter of his life.
Griffin’s departure marks the end of an era. The NBA of the early 2010s felt like his personal playground. While he never secured that elusive championship ring, his influence on the culture of the game—from his legendary commercials to his redefine-the-impossible dunks—ensures that his name will be etched in basketball history for decades to come.
The 1930s represented the darkest hour for American capitalism. Following the stock market crash of 1929, the United States spiraled into the Great Depression, an era defined by bread lines, 25% unemployment, and a total collapse of the banking system. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) took office in 1933, he famously declared that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." What followed was the New Deal—a whirlwind of legislative action, executive orders, and social experiments that fundamentally altered the relationship between the United States government and its citizens.
The New Deal was not a single, unified plan, but rather a series of programs and agencies, often referred to as "alphabet soup," designed to provide immediate relief, long-term recovery, and permanent reform. While its success is still debated by economists today, its legacy remains the bedrock of the modern American social contract.
The First Hundred Days and the First New Deal
Roosevelt’s presidency began with an unprecedented burst of activity known as the "First Hundred Days." His immediate priority was the stabilization of the financial system. Through the Emergency Banking Act, he declared a "bank holiday" to stop a run on deposits and used his "fireside chats" to restore public confidence. This period also saw the creation of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), which guaranteed bank deposits and remains a cornerstone of financial stability today.
To address the crushing poverty in rural and industrial areas, the First New Deal focused on "Relief and Recovery." The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) employed millions of young men in environmental projects, such as planting trees and building trails in national parks. Simultaneously, the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) sought to raise crop prices by paying farmers to reduce production, a controversial move intended to stabilize the collapsing agrarian economy. Meanwhile, the National Recovery Administration (NRA) attempted to organize industry through "codes of fair competition," though it was later struck down by the Supreme Court as an overreach of executive power.
The Second New Deal: Shifting Toward Reform
As the initial crisis abated, Roosevelt moved toward the "Second New Deal" (1935–1936), which shifted focus toward social justice and long-term security. This phase introduced the most enduring pillars of American life. The Social Security Act of 1935 established a safety net for the elderly, the unemployed, and the disabled, marking the first time the federal government took direct responsibility for the social welfare of its people.
This era also saw the passage of the Wagner Act, which guaranteed the right of workers to organize into unions and engage in collective bargaining. This gave rise to the modern labor movement and helped create the American middle class. To combat persistent unemployment, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) was launched, becoming the largest New Deal agency. The WPA didn’t just build bridges and roads; it employed artists, writers, and musicians, documenting American life and creating public works of art that still decorate post offices and city halls across the country.
The Critics and the Constitutional Crisis
The New Deal was far from universally popular. Conservative critics and business leaders attacked it as "socialism" and an unconstitutional expansion of federal power. On the other end of the spectrum, populist figures like Huey Long and Father Charles Coughlin argued that the New Deal did not go far enough in redistributing wealth.
The most significant challenge came from the judicial branch. The Supreme Court, dominated by conservative justices known as the "Four Horsemen," struck down several key pieces of legislation, including the NRA and the AAA. In response, a frustrated Roosevelt proposed the Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937—the infamous "court-packing plan." While the plan failed in Congress and cost FDR significant political capital, the Court eventually began upholding New Deal legislation, a shift often called "the switch in time that saved nine."
The New Deal Coalition and Political Realignment
The New Deal did more than change the economy; it reshaped American politics. It forged the "New Deal Coalition," a diverse and powerful voting bloc that included labor unions, blue-collar workers, racial and religious minorities (particularly African Americans and Catholics), and Southern Democrats. This coalition allowed the Democratic Party to dominate American politics for decades, controlling the White House and Congress for much of the mid-20th century.
However, the New Deal’s record on civil rights was mixed. While many programs provided aid to African Americans, others—like Social Security and the Wagner Act—initially excluded domestic and agricultural workers, categories that were predominantly Black. Furthermore, FDR often deferred to powerful Southern segregationist Democrats to ensure his economic bills passed, leaving the era’s systemic racism largely unchallenged at the federal level.
Legacy and Modern Echoes
The New Deal did not fully end the Great Depression—it was the massive industrial mobilization for World War II that finally brought the U.S. to full employment. However, it successfully prevented a total social collapse and created the regulatory framework that defined the post-war era. Agencies like the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) continue to function today, and the concept of a government "safety net" is now an inseparable part of the American identity.
In recent years, the New Deal has returned to the forefront of political discourse. Proponents of the "Green New Deal" look to FDR’s massive public works projects as a blueprint for tackling climate change, while the economic disruptions of the 21st century have led many to call for a renewed focus on the "Relief, Recovery, and Reform" tripos. Whether viewed as a savior of capitalism or a precursor to the welfare state, the New Deal remains the most significant domestic transformation in the history of the United States.
Six Republican governors are condemning efforts by the United Auto Workers to organize car factories in their states, a flash point as the labor group tries to build on its success last year winning concessions from the Big Three automakers by making inroads in the historically union-averse South.
"We have a responsibility to our constituents to speak up when we see special interests looking to come into our state and threaten our jobs and the values we live by," the governors of Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee and Texas said Tuesday in a joint statement.
The governors spoke out against the UAW a day before 4,300 Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga, Tenn., are set to start voting on whether to join the union. The factory is Volkswagen's North American electric-vehicle assembly hub, where the UAW narrowly lost union votes in 2014 and 2019. Workers at the plant will cast ballots from Wednesday through Friday evening.
Volkswagen has said it respects the workers' right to vote on whether to join the UAW. But the governors who criticized the union drive said "we do not need to pay a third party to tell us who can pick up a box or flip a switch," while also framing the campaign as a move to support President Joe Biden's reelection campaign.
"They're so scared," UAW strategist Chris Brooks wrote on social media in responding to the governors' statement.
The UAW in the fall negotiated record contracts for 150,000 workers at General Motors, Ford and Chrysler-parent Stellantis, while some nonunion factories also subsequently announced pay increases for workers. After leading a six-week strike at the companies, UAW President Shawn Fain last fall vowed to organize nonunion companies across the industry, from foreign automakers with U.S. operations to electric vehicle makers like Tesla.
In November, VW gave workers an 11% pay raise at the Chattanooga plant, but the UAW said VW's pay still lags behind the Detroit automakers. Top assembly plant workers in Chattanooga make $32.40 per hour, VW said.
The UAW pacts with Detroit automakers included 25% pay raises by the time the contracts end in April of 2028. With cost-of-living increases, workers will see about 33% in raises for a top assembly wage of $42 per hour, plus annual profit sharing.
The union is also gaining ground in other Southern states, with a majority of workers at a Mercedes-Benz plant near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, signing cards in support of joining the labor group.
The National Labor Relations Board on Thursday said the Alabama vote would take place from May 13 to May 17 at facilities in Vance and Woodstock. The Mercedes facilities had about 6,100 employees as of the end of 2023. More than 5,000 are calling for the union vote, UAW has said.
In response to the workers' petition, Mercedes-Benz U.S. International stated that it "fully respects our Team Members' choice (on) whether to unionize." The company added that it plans to ensure all workers have a chance to cast their own secret-ballot vote and have access to "the information necessary to make an informed choice" during the election process.
The UAW has accused Mercedes management of anti-union tactics in recent weeks, filing federal labor charges against the company.
LONDON (AP) — A radical restaging of Hollywood film noir musical “Sunset Boulevard” was the big winner on Sunday at the London stage Olivier Awards, taking seven trophies including best musical revival and best actress for American star Nicole Scherzinger.
Soccer-themed state-of-the-nation drama “Dear England” was named best new play, while Sarah Snook and Mark Gatiss were among the acting winners.
Scherzinger was rewarded for her performance as fading silver screen star Norma Desmond in a flashy revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Sunset Boulevard,” three decades after the musical’s 1990s debut. Her co-star Tom Francis won the corresponding best actor prize as a struggling screenwriter fatefully drawn into Desmond’s orbit.
Jamie Lloyd took the directing trophy for the technically innovative production, which melds live video with the onstage action and also won Oliviers for sound and lighting design. It’s due to open in New York later this year, and Lloyd predicted it would “take Broadway by storm.”
Scherzinger said that when she was growing up in Kentucky, “I always wanted to be a singer and do musicals.”
“I dreamed of so many roles I wanted to do — and honestly this role, Norma Desmond, was not one of those roles,” she said. “But God works in mysterious ways.”
The prize for best new musical went to “Operation Mincemeat,” a word-of-mouth hit based on an audacious real-life espionage operation that deceived the Nazis during World War II. The show began life in a tiny theater in 2019 and has moved to progressively larger venues, gathering accolades along the way.
“Stranger Things: The First Shadow,” a dazzlingly staged prequel to the Netflix supernatural series, was named best new entertainment or comedy.
The Oliviers — the U.K. equivalent of Broadway’s Tony Awards — are celebrating a bumper year for new shows in the West End, finally bouncing back from the COVID-19 pandemic. Several winners lamented the soaring cost of theater tickets, and cuts to arts education that are squeezing working-class talent out of theatrical careers and theater audiences.
“If you don’t tell a kid to go and see a show … they’re not going to develop that habit, they’re not going to get that experience,” said “Dear England” playwright James Graham, who grew up in a small mining town. “So I am really worried.”
But the mood was largely celebratory as “Ted Lasso” star Hannah Waddingham presided over an exuberant ceremony at London’s Royal Albert Hall, opening the show by belting out “Anything Goes” alongside the London Community Gospel Choir. The show was peppered with performances from several of the nominated musicals, including “Guys and Dolls,” “Hadestown” and homegrown hit “The Little Big Things.”
The prizes, which recognize achievements in theater, opera and dance, were founded in 1976 and named for the late actor-director Laurence Olivier. Winners are chosen by voting groups of stage professionals and theatergoers.
Snook – the scheming Shiv Roy in “Succession” – beat a talented field including Sarah Jessica Parker and Sophie Okonedo to be named best actress in a play for “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s cautionary fable in which Snook plays more than two dozen characters.
Backstage, the Emmy Award-winning Australian performer said the solo stage show was “so much harder” than doing TV.
“I’ve never done anything harder than this,” said Snook, who said she’d asked herself “why am I doing a 60,000-word monologue with an 8-month-old baby?” She revealed she’d learned her lines for the play during filming of the final series of “Succession,” at night while breastfeeding her daughter.
Gatiss — co-creator of the BBC TV series “Sherlock” — won the best actor trophy for playing theater great John Gielgud in “The Motive and the Cue,” Jack Thorne’s play about the struggle to mount a 1964 production of “Hamlet” with Richard Burton.
Gatiss recalled that Gielgud had considered awards ceremonies “vulgar.”
“I’m very, very thrilled to be in such wonderfully vulgar company,” he said.
Gatiss beat “Dear England” star Joseph Fiennes and Andrew Scott, who had been the favorite to win for the solo show “Vanya.” The Anton Chekhov adaptation by Simon Stephens took the prize for best revival.
Will Close was named best supporting actor in a play for his performance as footballer Harry Kane in “Dear England.”
Haydn Gwynne, who died in October, was posthumously awarded the best supporting actress prize for her final stage role in “When Winston Went to War with the Wireless,” about the early days of radio in Britain.
Awards for supporting performances in musicals were Amy Trigg for “The Little Big Things” and Jak Malone for “Operation Mincemeat.”
The show ended with a tribute to the National Theatre, which turned 60 in 2023 — culminating in a star-studded cast singing the anthem “You’ll Never Walk Alone.”
The sense of smell, or olfaction, is often the most overlooked of the human senses, yet it is phylogenetically the oldest and arguably one of the most complex. A recent comprehensive review published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience (PMC12203381) by researchers Thomas Brandt and Doreen Huppert explores the multifaceted nature of smell. By tracing its origins from primordial bacteria to modern neurology, the authors illustrate how this "mysterious" sense serves as a vital bridge between our evolutionary past, cultural history, and future medical diagnostics.
An Evolutionary Masterpiece
From a biological perspective, olfaction is unique. It is the only sensory system in mammals that relies on a massive gene family—comprising approximately 1,000 different genes—to identify thousands of distinct odorant molecules. This complexity stands in stark contrast to the sense of taste, which operates with just six primary receptors.
One of the most remarkable features of the olfactory system is its capacity for continuous regeneration. Olfactory receptor neurons have a lifespan of roughly one month, after which they are replaced through neurogenesis. This lifelong ability to generate new neurons from basal stem cells is a rare example of adult neurogenesis in humans, providing a biological safety net that allows for recovery following respiratory infections or head trauma. This mechanism became a focal point of global interest during the COVID-19 pandemic, as millions experienced transient or long-term anosmia (loss of smell).
Historical Perspectives: Magic and Medicine
Historically, the human relationship with scent has been deeply spiritual and social. In ancient cultures such as Egypt, Greece, and China, fragrances were not merely luxury items but were believed to possess magical and medicinal properties.
In Ancient Egypt, perfumes and resins played a central role in funeral rituals, specifically mummification, to prepare the body for the afterlife and gain divine favor. In Greek antiquity, philosophers like Plato and Aristotle attempted to categorize smells, though they struggled with the lack of a specific vocabulary. Aristotle noted that while humans can easily distinguish "pleasant" from "unpleasant" based on emotional and biological needs, our linguistic ability to name specific scents remains inferior to our ability to describe colors or sounds. This historical "hedonic" classification—where smells are judged by the pleasure or disgust they evoke—still dominates our modern interaction with perfumes and personal grooming.
The Neurology of Smell Disorders
In contemporary medicine, the "mystery" of smell is increasingly being solved through advanced imaging and clinical observation. The review highlights that olfactory dysfunction is often a "hidden" symptom, undetected by both patients and clinicians, yet it carries immense diagnostic weight.
Perhaps the most significant medical takeaway is the role of olfaction as a biomarker for neurodegenerative diseases. Research has shown that a declining sense of smell is one of the earliest clinical indicators of Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, often appearing years before motor or cognitive symptoms manifest. Furthermore, in conditions like Multiple Sclerosis, changes in olfactory threshold can help clinicians estimate inflammatory activity within the brain.
The neural network for olfaction is deeply intertwined with the limbic system, the brain's emotional center. This explains why certain scents can trigger vivid, decades-old memories (the "Proustian phenomenon") and why the loss of smell is so closely linked to depression, stress, and a diminished quality of life. When we lose our sense of smell, we don't just lose the ability to appreciate a meal; we lose a primary connection to our emotions and social environments.
A Call for Clinical Recognition
Despite its critical importance, olfactory testing is rarely a standard part of medical training or routine check-ups. Brandt and Huppert argue for a paradigm shift, suggesting that more intensive implementation of olfactory function testing could revolutionize early diagnosis for a variety of neurological disorders.
The sense of smell also serves a vital compensatory role. Studies of blind individuals have revealed that they often possess superior odor thresholds and a heightened ability to discriminate dangerous or decomposing food compared to sighted controls. This suggests that the brain can reallocate resources to the olfactory system when other senses fail, further proving the plasticity and resilience of the human brain.
Conclusion
The sense of smell is a paradox: it is our most primitive tool for survival—aiding in nutrition, threat detection, and mating—yet it is also a sophisticated gateway to our highest cortical functions. From the ancient belief in the magic of incense to the cutting-edge use of scent as a window into the aging brain, olfaction remains a fundamental part of the human experience. As science continues to unravel the genetic and neurological mysteries of how we smell, it becomes clear that this "hidden" sense is, in fact, one of our most powerful links to our health and our history.
Tracy Harden stood outside her Chuck’s Dairy Bar in Rolling Fork, teary eyed, remembering not the EF-4 tornado that nearly wiped the town off the map two years before. Instead, she became emotional, “even after all this time,” she said, thinking of the overwhelming help people who’d come from all over selflessly offered.
“We’re back now, she said, smiling. “People have been so kind.”
“I stepped out of that cooler two years ago and saw everything, and I mean, everything was just… gone,” she said, her voice trailing off. “My God, I thought. What are we going to do now? But people came and were so giving. It’s remarkable, and such a blessing.”
“And to have another one come on almost the exact date the first came,” she said, shaking her head. “I got word from these young storm chasers I’d met. He told me they were tracking this one, and it looked like it was coming straight for us in Rolling Fork.”
“I got up and went outside.”
“And there it was!”
“I cannot tell you what went through me seeing that tornado form in the sky.”
The tornado that touched down in Rolling Fork last Sunday did minimal damage and claimed no lives.
Horns honk as people travel along U.S. 61. Harden smiles and waves.
She heads back into her restaurant after chatting with friends to resume grill duties as people, some local, some just passing through town, line up for burgers and ice cream treats.
Rolling Fork is mending, slowly. Although there is evidence of some rebuilding such as new homes under construction, many buildings like the library and post office remain boarded up and closed. A brutal reminder of that fateful evening two years ago.
In the annals of economic thought, few works stand as prominently or as controversially as Ludwig von Mises’ Human Action: A Treatise on Economics. Published in 1949, this magnum opus is not merely an economics textbook; it is a comprehensive philosophical defense of laissez-faire capitalism and a profound investigation into the nature of human decision-making. At nearly 900 pages, Mises constructs a rigorous logical framework that attempts to demonstrate that the free market is not just an efficient system for resource allocation, but the very foundation of civilization and personal freedom.
The Foundation of Praxeology
The core of Human Action is built upon a methodology Mises termed "praxeology"—the science of human action. Unlike the natural sciences, which rely on observation, experimentation, and the hunt for constant external laws, Mises argued that economics must be rooted in a priori truths. He began with a single, self-evident axiom: "human action is purposeful behavior."
From this starting point, Mises deduced that individuals act because they are in a state of unease and believe that by using specific "means," they can achieve a "more satisfactory state." This shift from objective to subjective value was revolutionary. In Mises’ view, value does not reside in objects themselves but in the minds of the actors who rank those objects based on their own internal goals. This subjective theory of value allows for a universal understanding of human behavior that transcends culture, race, or class—a direct rebuttal to the "polylogism" of his day, which claimed that different groups possessed fundamentally different logical structures.
The Market as a Process of Calculation
One of the most critical arguments in Human Action concerns the necessity of economic calculation. Mises famously contended that socialism is "economically impossible" because it lacks a market-driven price system. Without private ownership of the means of production, there can be no genuine exchange of capital goods, and therefore no market prices for those goods.
Prices are not just numbers; they are signals that encapsulate the relative scarcity of resources and the shifting desires of billions of consumers. Without these signals, a central planner is effectively "groping in the dark," unable to determine which production methods are efficient or which consumer needs are most urgent. For Mises, the market is a grand, decentralized computer that coordinates the actions of an entire society through the medium of money prices, ensuring that resources are directed toward their most highly valued uses.
The Dangers of the Hampered Market
A significant portion of the treatise is dedicated to "The Hampered Market Economy," where Mises analyzes the effects of government intervention. He was a staunch critic of what he called "interventionism"—a middle-of-the-road policy that attempts to preserve the market while introducing piecemeal controls like minimum wages, price ceilings, or credit expansion.
Mises argued that these interventions are inherently self-defeating. For instance, if the government artificially lowers the price of milk to help the poor, it reduces the incentive for farmers to produce milk, leading to shortages. The government must then either repeal the price control or intervene further—perhaps by subsidizing farmers or controlling the prices of cow feed—leading to a "spiraling" effect that eventually necessitates total state control.
His analysis of the business cycle is equally biting. Mises attributed the "boom-and-bust" cycles of modern economies to central bank manipulation of interest rates. By artificially lowering rates through credit expansion, banks encourage "malinvestments"—capital projects that appear profitable but are actually unsustainable. When the credit bubble eventually bursts, the result is a painful but necessary economic downturn as the market attempts to purge these inefficiencies.
Social Cooperation and the Great Society
Despite its reputation as a cold, technical work, Human Action is deeply concerned with the preservation of social peace. Mises argued that the division of labor is the greatest tool for human cooperation. When individuals specialize and trade, they find that their own well-being is tied to the well-being of others. This "Law of Association" (inspired by David Ricardo) suggests that even the most productive person benefits from cooperating with the least productive, creating a natural incentive for peace over conflict.
For Mises, capitalism is the only system that reconciles the pursuit of individual interest with the needs of the community. In a market society, a person can only increase their own wealth by serving others—producing the goods and services that fellow citizens are willing to pay for. This "consumer sovereignty" ensures that the ultimate direction of the economy is determined by the "masses" rather than a political elite.
A Lasting Legacy
Today, Human Action remains a cornerstone of the Austrian School of economics and a primary text for libertarians and free-market advocates worldwide. While modern mainstream economics has moved toward mathematical modeling and empirical testing—methods Mises largely rejected—his insights into the importance of prices, the role of time and uncertainty, and the dangers of monetary manipulation continue to resonate.
Human Action is more than a defense of a specific economic policy; it is a plea for the recognition of the individual as the ultimate source of all social phenomena. In an age of increasing centralization and digital surveillance, Mises’ warning remains stark: civilization depends on the freedom of the acting individual to make choices, take risks, and pursue happiness in a market unhampered by the dictates of the state.
WEST SACRAMENTO — The first thing the Athletics did to mark their move to Sacramento was erase the city.
Just 10 days into last offseason, the ballclub’s public relations department released “Brand Transition Guidelines” for the temporary layover in Sacramento. “When referring to the team name, use only ‘Athletics,’” the release read. “You may use ‘A’s’ on second reference. ATH is the approved designation for the Athletics.”
They were no longer the Oakland A’s, but they also wouldn’t become the Sacramento A’s. And months later, it might be affecting attendance at games these major league squatters play in the state’s capital.
“What the A’s haven’t done is give people a reason to come to the games,” Leon Hunt, a Rocklin resident, told SFGATE during the A’s June 4 game against the Minnesota Twins. “Let’s start with the Sacramento thing. They didn’t embrace Sacramento. So there’s a lot of people out there, I think, that are saying, ‘Hey, if you’re not gonna embrace me, why should I embrace you?’”
The A’s are scheduled for a three-year stay (at minimum) in town after ditching their East Bay home in a move that devastated any baseball fan with a heart. The organization told the New York Times in March that going by just the team nickname was “the most respectful” option.
While fans and pundits alike can debate the validity of that sentiment, there’s no debating that this rejection has downstream consequences. Rebecca Edgar, a season ticket holder from Carmichael, a Sacramento suburb, told SFGATE at the June 4 game that there are still people who don’t know about the A’s moving to Sacramento and that she has to be the one to inform them they’ll be in town for the next three to four years. The dismal attendance numbers indicate she’s probably not the only one who’s had to do some guerrilla marketing on behalf of the team.
Considering there’s a noticeable lack of Sacramento pride in and around the ballpark, perhaps it’s not residents’ fault they’re unaware. Not only is the city not present in the team name, but it’s also hardly present in the stadium, with the only noticeable mention of “Sacramento” being on top of the home dugout. For a while, that was the only reference to the state capital at all, beyond an occasional flash of the Sacramento-themed sleeve patch — the Tower Bridge in A’s colors — between innings on the big screen. That patch is on one sleeve of the Athletics’ jerseys, and a Vegas patch is on the other. That same image is also on the outfield wall in yet another reminder to Sacramentans that the A’s have their hearts and minds set elsewhere.
It stands in contrast to parts of the 916. Banners on light posts around West Sacramento streets read, “The baseball side of the river,” and “Every day is game day,” in reference to the team and the Triple-A River Cats. A local sports apparel shop close to the stadium put up a sign welcoming the Athletics to town, and other establishments nearby went as far as renaming some menu items after the A’s.
Despite the prevailing sentiment at the reverse boycott, at the Opening Day boycott and at the Coliseum’s final game — “f—k John Fisher,” essentially — there are still some fans who stuck with the Athletics after their move east. They’ve perhaps been the quickest to notice the A’s shirking of Sacramento. Josh Saluda, a 20-year-old lifelong A’s fan, summed up the sentiment that several other A’s fans shared with SFGATE: Yes, they were pissed off at Fisher, the team owner, for taking the franchise away from Oakland, but when the A’s landed in Sacramento, they realized they still wanted to see their favorite team up close before the move to Vegas. And they couldn’t ignore Fisher’s disrespect of his new host city.
“To me that is a huge insult to the city of Sacramento because they accepted the A’s with open arms, and to not even use the name, even for just three years — you’re using their city, the least you can do for them is use the city’s name,” said Saluda, who was starting “Let’s go Oakland!” chants as early as the first inning. Saluda, a student at San Jose State University who was raised in the East Bay, admitted he contemplated becoming a San Francisco Giants fan but couldn’t stomach it. He’d rather make the drive to Sacramento than switch allegiances, he said, which makes the team’s disinterest sting even more.
“You took away the A’s, the only thing left of Oakland’s heart, and now you’re just called the Athletics? That’s messed up.”
“It’s bulls—t,” said Tim, a 25-year-old lifelong fan who declined to provide his last name. “I mean, they’re selling merch in the colors of the A’s that just say Sacramento, but it can’t say A’s after. I think it’s the most overtly capitalist thing to be like, here’s this team that’s so appreciated and loved by so many people, but let’s just turn it into the most corporate thing ever.”
It’s bad enough that A’s fans are feeling burned by the team (again), but even fans from visiting teams have started to notice this detachment from the city, which is more problematic. After all, part of the financial appeal of a Las Vegas franchise is that it’s geared toward visiting tourists who come to Sin City to see their favorite team square off against the home side. It’s probably not a good sign when those potential visitors start to notice issues with how the organization is handling its temporary home. Ryan Murphy, an 18-year-old recent high school graduate and Giants fan, couldn’t quite understand why the Athletics haven’t embraced Sacramento with more than just a cosmetic acknowledgment.
“I mean, they are wearing the patch on the sleeve, so they’re at least embracing that a little bit,” he said on June 4. “But it’s not like they’re here for like half a season. They’re going to be here for three years. So the fact that they’re not rocking Sacramento at all I do think is a little strange.”
“I think if they’re playing here for three years, they do have an opportunity to embrace that Sacramento name,” Terry Green, a Twins fan, and Department of Public Health employee, attending the June 4 matchup, told SFGATE. “Sacramento’s the capital of California. Why not be proud of that? Why not be proud of bringing your team to Sacramento, and showing off your state pride by being in the capital?”
There are, of course, fans who lean closer to what could arguably be described as Fisher’s ideal sentiment: indifference. Michael Lohr, a 46-year-old fan from Sacramento, told SFGATE it’d be “better” if the city were in the team name, but he gets that the team doesn’t want to create confusion with its branding. Michael Katches, a 30-year-old from Roseville, said he was “just stoked that the A’s are in Sac.” Jennifer Gutierrez, a 67-year-old retiree from Stockton, said the feeling of attending an MLB game at Sutter Health Park was “weird” and “strange,” but the name didn’t matter to her because “we know that they’re kind of in limbo. I think it’s a nonissue.”
Of course, the team’s new home mattered in other ways. Gutierrez and her husband, Al, were season ticket holders for 54 years in Oakland. Despite the fact that they live closer to Sutter Health Park, they didn’t renew this season because, as Al tells it, “They disappointed me by moving.”
Perhaps what’s most frustrating about the franchise’s bare-minimum Sacramento acknowledgment — the A’s have just started to sell apparel that has “Sacramento” on it — is the juxtaposition with how visibly Sacramento the ballpark is to locals. As soon as someone enters the front gates, or walks along the wide-open concourse, they see the city’s iconic Tower Bridge as the backdrop beyond right field, and the distinct Ziggurat lights up for night games out beyond left center. To those who know the area well, it’d be a great setting for an MLB team to embrace, whether it’s the A’s or otherwise.
“We love baseball,” said Lewis McGeorge, a season ticket holder from Roseville. “We love all of it. The owner’s a piece of s—t. We would love to have baseball here. It just needs to be done better.”
NEW YORK, March 28 (Reuters) - Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a judge on Thursday for stealing $8 billion from customers of the now-bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange he founded, the last step in the former billionaire wunderkind's dramatic downfall.
U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan handed down the sentence at a Manhattan court hearing after rejecting Bankman-Fried's claim that FTX customers did not actually lose money and accusing him of lying during his trial testimony. A jury found Bankman-Fried, 32, guilty on Nov. 2 on seven fraud and conspiracy counts stemming from FTX's 2022 collapse in what prosecutors have called one of the biggest financial frauds in U.S. history.
Kaplan said Bankman-Fried had shown no remorse.
"He knew it was wrong," Kaplan said of Bankman-Fried before handing down the sentence. "He knew it was criminal. He regrets that he made a very bad bet about the likelihood of getting caught. But he is not going to admit a thing, as is his right."
Bankman-Fried stood with his hands clasped before him as Kaplan read the sentence. He was led out of the courtroom by members of the U.S. Marshals Service when the hearing ended.
Bankman-Fried, wearing a beige short-sleeve jail t-shirt, acknowledged during 20 minutes of remarks to the judge that FTX customers had suffered and he offered an apology to his former FTX colleagues.
The sentence marked the culmination of Bankman-Fried's plunge from an ultra-wealthy entrepreneur and major political donor to the biggest trophy to date in a crackdown by U.S. authorities on malfeasance in cryptocurrency markets. Bankman-Fried has vowed to appeal his conviction and sentence.
Kaplan said he had found that FTX customers lost $8 billion, FTX's equity investors lost $1.7 billion, and that lenders to the Alameda Research hedge fund Bankman-Fried founded lost $1.3 billion.
"The defendant's assertion that FTX customers and creditors will be paid in full is misleading, it is logically flawed, it is speculative," Kaplan said. "A thief who takes his loot to Las Vegas and successfully bets the stolen money is not entitled to a discount on the sentence by using his Las Vegas winnings to pay back what he stole."
The judge also said Bankman-Fried lied during his trial testimony when he said he did not know that his hedge fund had spent customer deposits taken from FTX.
Federal prosecutors had sought a prison sentence of 40 to 50 years. Bankman-Fried's defense lawyer Marc Mukasey had argued that a sentence of less than 5-1/4 years would be appropriate.
Addressing the judge, Bankman-Fried said, "Customers have been suffering... I didn't at all mean to minimize that. I also think that's something that was missing from what I've said over the course of this process, and I'm sorry for that."
Referring to his FTX colleagues, Bankman-Fried told the judge, "They put a lot of themselves into it, and I threw that all away. It haunts me every day."
Three of his former close associates testified as prosecution witnesses at trial that he had directed them to use FTX customer funds to plug losses at Alameda Research.
'MASSIVE IN SCALE'
Nicolas Roos, a prosecutor with the U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan, told the judge, "The criminality here is massive in scale. It was pervasive in all aspects of the business."
During the hearing, Mukasey sought to distance his client from notorious fraudsters like Bernie Madoff.
"Sam was not a ruthless financial serial killer who set out every morning to hurt people," Mukasey said, describing his client as an "awkward math nerd" who worked hard to get customers their money back after FTX's collapse.
"Sam Bankman-Fried doesn't make decisions with malice in his heart," Mukasey added. "He makes decisions with math in his head."
Bankman-Fried testified in his own defense that he made mistakes such as not implementing a risk management team, but denied he intended to defraud anyone or steal customers' money.
His parents, Stanford University law professors Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, attended the sentencing.
A Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduate, Bankman-Fried rode a boom in the values of bitcoin and other digital assets to a net worth of $26 billion, according to Forbes magazine, before he turned 30.
Bankman-Fried became known for his mop of unkempt curly hair and commitment to a movement known as effective altruism, which encourages talented young people to focus on earning money and giving it away to worthy causes. He also was one of the biggest contributors to Democratic candidates and political causes ahead of the 2022 U.S. midterm elections.
But prosecutors have said the responsible image he cultivated concealed his years-long embezzlement of customer funds.
Bankman-Fried has been detained at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn since August 2023, when Kaplan revoked his bail after finding he likely tampered with witnesses at least twice.
The air was as crisp as a hundred dollar bill, on April 27, 1936. A southwesterly breeze filled the bright white sails of the pleasure boats sailing across the San Francisco Bay. Through the cabin window of a ferryboat, a man studied the horizon. His tired eyes were hooded, his dark hair swept backwards, his hands and feet locked in iron chains. Behind a curtain of grey mist, he caught his first dreadful glimpse of Alcatraz Island.
“Count” Victor Lustig, 46 years old at the time, was America’s most dangerous con man. In a lengthy criminal career, his sleight-of-hand tricks and get-rich-quick schemes had rocked Jazz-Era America and the rest of the world. In Paris, he had sold the Eiffel Tower in an audacious confidence game—not once, but twice. Finally, in 1935, Lustig was captured after masterminding a counterfeit banknote operation so vast that it threatened to shake confidence in the American economy. A judge in New York sentenced him to 20 years on Alcatraz.
Lustig was unlike any other inmate to arrive on the Rock. He dressed like a matinee idol, possessed a hypnotic charm, spoke five languages fluently and evaded the law like a figure from fiction. In fact, the Milwaukee Journal described him as ‘a story book character’. One Secret Service agent wrote that Lustig was “as elusive as a puff of cigarette smoke and as charming as a young girl’s dream,” while the New York Times editorialized: “He was not the hand-kissing type of bogus Count—too keen for that. Instead of theatrical, he was always the reserved, dignified noble man.”
The fake title was just the tip of Lustig’s deceptions. He used 47 aliases and carried dozens of fake passports. He created a web of lies so thick that even today his true identity remains shrouded in mystery. On his Alcatraz paperwork, prison officials called him “Robert V. Miller,” which was just another of his pseudonyms. The con man had always claimed to hail from a long line of aristocrats who owned European castles, yet newly discovered documents reveal more humble beginnings.
In prison interviews, he told investigators that he was born in the Austria-Hungarian town of Hostinné on January 4, 1890. The village is arranged around a Baroque clock tower in the shadow of the Krkonoše mountains (it is now a part of the Czech Republic). During his crime spree, Lustig had boasted that his father, Ludwig, was the burgomaster, or mayor, of the town. But in recently uncovered prison papers, he describes his father and mother as the “poorest peasant people” who raised him in a grim house made from stone. Lustig claimed he stole to survive, but only from the greedy and dishonest.
More textured accounts of Lustig’s childhood can be found in various true crime magazines of the time, informed by his criminal associates and investigators. In the early 1900s, as a teenager, Lustig scampered up the criminal ladder, progressing from panhandler to pickpocket, to burglar, to street hustler. According to True Detective Mysteries magazine he perfected every card trick known: “palming, slipping cards from the deck, dealing from the bottom,” and by the time he reached adulthood, Lustig could make a deck of cards “do everything but talk.”
First-class passengers aboard transatlantic ships became his first victims. The newly rich were easy pickings. When Lustig arrived in the United States at the end of World War I, the “Roaring Twenties” were in full swing and money was changing hands at a fevered pace. Lustig quickly became known to detectives in 40 American cities as ‘the Scarred,’ thanks to a livid, two-and-a-half inch gash along his left cheekbone, a souvenir from a love rival in Paris. Yet Lustig was a considered a “smoothie” who had never held a gun, and enjoyed mounting butterflies. Records show that he was just five-foot-seven-inches tall and weighed 140 pounds.
His most successful scam was the “Rumanian money box.” It was a small box fashioned from cedar wood, with complicated rollers and brass dials. Lustig claimed the contraption could copy banknotes using “Radium.” The big show he gave to victims was sometimes aided by a sidekick named “Dapper” Dan Collins, described by the New York Times as a former ‘circus lion tamer and death-defying bicycle rider.’ Lustig’s repertoire also included fake horse race schemes, feigned seizures during business meetings, and bogus real estate investments. These capers made him a public enemy and a millionaire.
America in the 1920s was infested with such confidence rackets, operated by smooth-talking immigrants like Charles Ponzi, namesake of the “Ponzi scheme.” These European con artists were professionals who called their victims ‘marks’ instead of suckers, and who acted not like thugs, but gentlemen. According to the crime magazine True Detective, Lustig was a man who “society took by one hand, the underworld by the other…a flesh-and-blood Jekyll-Hyde.” Yet he treated all women with respect. On November 3, 1919, he married a pretty Kansan named Roberta Noret. A memoir by Lustig’s late daughter recalls how Lustig raised a secret family on whom he lavished his ill-gotten gains. The rest he spent on gambling, and on his lover, Billie Mae Scheible, the buxom owner of a million-dollar prostitution racket.
Then, in 1925, he embarked upon what swindling experts call “the big store.”
Lustig arrived in Paris in May of that year, according to the memoir of U.S. Secret Service agent James Johnson. There, Lustig commissioned stationary carrying the official French government seal. Next, he presented himself at the front desk of the Hôtel de Crillon, a stone palace on the Place de la Concorde. From there, pretending to be a French government official, Lustig wrote to the top people in the French scrap metal industry, inviting them to the hotel for a meeting.