Starved of migrants, the Metropolitan Opera decides to migrate to Saudi Arabia

In June we learned that undocumented migrants were big customers for the Metropolitan Opera (AP):

Metropolitan Opera season attendance dropped slightly following the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown that coincided with a decrease in tourists to New York.

The solution to a migration-related problem is always… more migration. September: “The Met Opera Turns to Saudi Arabia to Help Solve Its Financial Woes” (New York Times).

The Metropolitan Opera, one of the world’s most renowned performing arts companies, is turning to Saudi Arabia to help it solve some of the most severe financial problems in its 142-year history.

The company has reached a lucrative agreement with the kingdom that calls for it to perform there for three weeks each winter. While neither the Met nor the Saudis disclosed financial terms when they announced a memorandum of understanding on Wednesday, the deal is expected to bring the Met more than $100 million.

The Met hopes the agreement will help it emerge from a period of acute financial woes. Since the coronavirus pandemic, the company has withdrawn more than a third of the money in its endowment fund to help it cover operating costs — about $120 million overall, including $50 million to help pay for the season that ended in June. The withdrawals have raised questions about the viability of staging live opera on a grand scale in the 21st century.

As we prepare for Bisexual Awareness Week (Sept 16-23) and LGBT History Month (October) and Trans Awareness Month (November), it will be interesting to think about how the Met’s LGBTQ+-themed lighting will be used in Saudi Arabia:

Here’s what the new opera house in suburban Riyadh will look like when it opens in 2028, but before the Met’s rainbow lighting scheme is applied:

The Met began spending in a whole new direction in 2021 (NYT):

“The Met Opera Has a Gay Conductor. Yes, That Matters.” (NYT, 2019):

Mr. Nézet-Séguin — who has been openly gay for his entire professional career and nonchalant enough about it to post a smiling partners’ beach selfie on Instagram — is impossible to miss.

“The fact that he’s so comfortable with who he is is part of what makes him a powerful, effective artistic leader,” Peter Gelb, the Met’s general manager, said in an interview. “Because he is proud of who he is, and that’s very important.”

ChatGPT:

In Saudi Arabia, engaging in same-sex sexual activity—whether between two men or two women—is illegal under the country’s interpretation of Islamic (Sharia) law. The legal consequences are extremely severe and can vary depending on the specifics of the case and judicial discretion. Same-sex acts are considered sodomy or illicit sexual intercourse (zina) and are punishable by death under traditional Wahhabi interpretations of Sharia law. Even when the death penalty is not applied, those convicted may face indefinite prison sentences, flogging, financial penalties, or deportation in the case of foreign nationals. … Saudi Arabia enforces some of the strictest laws against same-sex relations in the world. Punishments include—but are not limited to—execution, flogging, prolonged imprisonment, hefty fines, and deportation.

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Latino Conservation Week

Today is the first day of Latino Conservation Week (not to be confused with Latinx Conservation Week, the (Deplorable) Latino Conservative Week, or the (turncoat) Latinx Conservative Week). From Audubon, the society named after a notorious advocate for slavery:

LCW events are inclusive of all communities but, in particular, are events that break down barriers Latino communities face when it comes to outdoor recreation and/or conservation efforts.

The National Park Service, under the cruel divisive tyranny of Donald Trump, doesn’t seem to be observing this “inclusive of all communities” week. Their web page on the subject dates to your tax dollars being at work in 2024:

(Despite Joe Biden’s advocacy for 2SLGBTQQIA+ community, note the government’s failure to use the correct gender-inclusive term “Latinx”.)

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Cuban government much smarter than U.S. government?

“Motel beheading suspect’s criminal history reveals escalating path of violent crime” (NBC Dallas):

Yordanis Cobos-Martinez was previously arrested on charges of indecency with a child, carjacking, false imprisonment and grand theft of a motor vehicle. … Four months later, in June 2017, in South Lake Tahoe, California, a police report details a carjacking in which Cobos-Martinez, while naked, tried to force himself into a woman’s car while pulling her hair and clothes and sitting on her lap. … ICE says he was released on an order of supervision under the Biden administration and because Cuba would not accept him based on his criminal history.

What did this noble migrant do? “ICE calls for removal of man accused of beheading another man with machete at Dallas motel” (CNN):

Police say Cobos-Martinez was cleaning a room with an unnamed witness as the incident unfolded. The witness told police Cobos-Martinez became upset when the victim, Chandra Nagamallaiah, used the unidentified witness to translate his request to not use a broken washing machine instead of speaking to him directly, according to the affidavit.

Surveillance video shows Cobos-Martinez leaving the motel room, pulling out a machete and attacking Nagamallaiah. After the victim ran, the attack continued outside – in front of the victim’s wife and son – both of whom attempted to intervene, according to the affidavit. After beheading Nagamallaiah, Cobos-Martinez allegedly placed the victim’s head in a dumpster.

Should we give the Cuban government credit for being smarter than the U.S. government? Cuban officials protected their own citizens/residents by wisely giving Americans what Americans voted for (i.e., to collect a miscellaneous assortment of humans from all of the world’s most violent and dysfunctional societies with particular emphasis on collecting those directly embroiled in violence).

Separately, this latest beheading seems to be another example of Migrant A killing Migrant B on U.S. soil, similar to Indian enricher Harjinger Singh killing three Haitians in Florida (NY Post).

Related:

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Raging inflation despite high interest rates

Inflation is currently raging at an annual rate of 4.8 percent (up 0.4 percent in the last month times 12) and is 2.9 percent if we look back to August 2024. From the BLS, yesterday:

High interest rates from the Fed haven’t slain the inflation dragon. My posts on this subject:

How eagerly/aggressively is Congress indulging in deficit spending right now? From the Bipartisan Policy Center (a “center” with two or three people in it?):

FY2025 (purple) is one of the most profligate years in U.S. history, but it doesn’t look that profligate because Congress was borrowing/printing money at an even faster rate during coronapanic.

Flash back to January 2, 1957, in which the New York Times praises President Eisenhower for eliminating an astounding and upsetting $4 billion deficit for 1954 (adjusted for the inflation that the government assures us does not exist, this would correspond to a $48 billion deficit in 2025 (compare to the nearly $2 trillion deficit that Congress seems to have built into our economy and government; Eisenhower took strenuous action to eliminate a deficit that was 1/40th the size of today’s deficit)).

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A visit to the United Flight 93 crash site

As part of the return trip from EAA AirVenture (“Oshkosh”) this year, we stopped at the Flight 93 National Memorial. It’s a 30-minute drive from the idiot-proof ridgetop airport that serves Johnstown, Pennsylvania (see Climate Change Reading List: Johnstown Flood).

The architecture is moving and designed around a walkway that follows the flight path of the airliner that jihadis had hoped to turn into a weapon against the U.S. Capitol. The path picks up after you go to a lower section of the memorial where the Boeing 757 actually crashed.

The building itself contains a lot of information about 9/11, not just the Flight 93 history. Visitors can listen to three phone messages to family members left by passengers on Flight 93.

Here are some of the outdoor signs:

A Harley is parked just outside the main building and includes Todd Beamer‘s final recorded words: “Let’s Roll”.

The walkway to the Wall of Names:

There’s a 93-foot-tall Tower of Voices of wind-driven chimes that look like aircraft parts (audio recording).

It’s a fitting memorial to a group of people who gave their lives in order to spare the lives of Americans on the ground.

Here’s the Hollywood version with the “Let’s Roll” line about 4 minutes in:

RIP especially to the crew: Lorraine Bay, Jason Dahl, Sandra Bradshaw, Wanda Green, LeRoy Homer Jr., CeeCee Lyles, and Deborah Welsh. Airline crews enable us to live richer lives by assuming a higher level of risk every day than those of us who earn our wages by flying desks.

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Charlie Kirk on assassination culture

I didn’t follow Charlie Kirk and had never seen one of his videos, but I was sad to hear about his death today. Sad/prescient post of his from five months ago:

Although I don’t have any personal theories about who might have perpetrated this assassination nor the political leanings of the killer, the statistics that Charlie Kirk put forward above seem right. At least half of my Democrat friends in Massachusetts would kill prominent Republicans, such as Donald Trump, if they thought they could get away with it. They would be doing it not to indulge their rage at people who disagree with them, though they have a lot of rage, but to protect our democracy. Note that most of them would likely prefer less extreme measures, e.g., outlawing voting for candidates who aren’t approved by the Democrats, deporting all Republicans to Eswatini, or making it illegal for Republicans to run for office (a simple measure to protect our democracy from January 6 insurrectionists).

The text of Charlie Kirk’s April 7, 2025 tweet, in case it gets memory-holed:

Assassination culture is spreading on the left. Forty-eight percent of liberals say it would be at least somewhat justified to murder Elon Musk. Fifty-five percent said the same about Donald Trump.

In California, activists are naming ballot measures after Luigi Mangione.

The left is being whipped into a violent frenzy. Any setback, whether losing an election or losing a court case, justifies a maximally violent response.

This is the natural outgrowth of left-wing protest culture tolerating violence and mayhem for years on end. The cowardice of local prosecutors and school officials have turned the left into a ticking time bomb.

A lot of Charlie Kirk’s recent posts on X were about Iryna Zarutska, murdered by a prime example of the heritability of criminality. Decarlos Brown Jr. is the perpetrator (recorded on video, but that’s not enough for his name to appear on the Wikipedia page as a potential suspect). His brother Stacey Dejon Brown is a convicted murderer (2014 article about a 2012 crime). Their father, Decarlos Brown Sr. is also a convicted criminal (NY Post).

Related:

  • Democrat thought-leader Rashida Tlaib, 2023: “Let’s not forget that Republicans are the Party of Insurrection” (i.e., it would be rational to kill Republicans in order to prevent our democracy from being subverted)
  • A response to the shooting by someone with a lot of experience in this area, below.
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Defend a house against woodpeckers using robot drones?

Homeowners around the world suffer a lot of damage due to woodpeckers. How about a system of microphones around the house that listen for the sound of a woodpecker and, if heard, dispatches a drone that lives somewhere on the edge of the exterior, maybe under an eave? The drone will then use its own microphone and camera to locate the woodpecker and harass it, with a water pistol if necessary, until the woodpecker finds a tree or an unprotected home to destroy.

ChatGPT refused to draw a picture of a drone discouraging a woodpecker with harmless water: “I can’t create an image that depicts harm being done to an animal — including a woodpecker being shot with water. … Instead of water hitting the bird, the drone could be shown with a water spray or mist aimed at the trim (not at the bird), to illustrate the concept of “protecting the house” without showing harm to the animal.” It then proceeded to generate an image that looks to me like the poor bird is being blasted with water:

(The Gaza Health Ministry reports that more than 60,000 woodpeckers have been killed via water pistol.)

Grok didn’t comment on my desire to see a photo of violence being done to a woodpecker, but it decided that the stream of water should emerge from the woodpecker:

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Do we all need the new iPhone 17 Pro Max?

The latest iPhones are announced. According to the potentially-lying New York Times, the cameras on the Pro series have bigger sensors, which could be huge, so to speak, for image quality:

As for the camera systems, the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max come equipped with an 18-megapixel front-facing camera with support for Center Stage and a wider field of view, along with enhanced, widescreen selfie support. On the back, all three cameras are 48 MP lenses, including a 48 MP telephoto camera with up to 8x optical zoom and support for 40x digital zoom. The sensors are 56% larger than the previous generation for sharper, more detailed images. The telephoto camera leverages an updated photonic engine that preserves natural detail, reduces detail, and improves color accuracy.

Note that a fixed telephoto lens that does not zoom is characterized as “8x optical zoom”. Also, the information about larger sensors might be #FakeNews. Apple’s own site suggests that only the telephoto camera sensor is larger:

The dual-capture video could be fun, at least for people who are attractive (inset photo of the phone owner from the front camera while the main video is taken by a rear camera).

Those of us with IQs over 207 can take advantage of the built-in Thread support? (Who among us is actually using Thread at home? Are there more IoT companies than non-WiFi IoT devices that actually get used on a daily basis?)

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What was our rationale for wanting to continue to host immigrants after they were convicted of crimes?

“Man Who’d Served His Time in U.S. Is Deported to an African Prison” (New York Times, September 1, 2025):

Mr. Etoria came to the United States [from Jamaica] on a green card in 1976 at age 12. He joined his mother, who had been sponsored by a family she worked for as a nanny, said Ms. McKen, his aunt. He had tough times early in life, she said. He saw his mother flee from his abusive father. In the United States, he struggled to adjust and was bullied in school, she said.

Mr. Etoria has a history of drug abuse, which he has blamed in part on head injuries he suffered as a child. He was also diagnosed with schizophrenia. Doctors noted that he has exhibited violent outbursts, hallucinations and paranoia, according to court records.

He was arrested in 1981 on charges of attempted murder, robbery and kidnapping. During a psychiatric evaluation, he said he could not remember exactly what happened, according to court records. He pleaded guilty and served three years in prison.

More than a decade later, Mr. Etoria walked into a leather goods shop and shot the victim three times in the head, according to Brooklyn court records. The motive was never determined, and there was no indication that he knew the victim or that the crime was gang-related.

I’m trying to figure out what our rationale has been for wanting to keep an immigrant after he “served three years in prison” for “attempted murder, robbery and kidnapping.” Why didn’t we deport him back to Jamaica in the 1980s, before he had a chance to commit murder? The U.S. government had the right to deport him, I think, but a bureaucrat somewhere concluded that American citizens would somehow be better off keeping Mr. Etoria as a neighbor?

Here’s a good window into how the female humans of America are implementing Charles Darwin’s sexual selection:

Since leaving prison in 2021, Mr. Etoria, a father of three adult children, has spoken regularly with his aunt, she said.

I.e., the schizophrenic convicted criminal has enjoyed far greater reproductive success than the typical American male who works 50 hours per week, pays taxes, and has never been arrested. Maybe that actually was the rationale for keeping him around? American women want to breed with convicted criminals and there aren’t enough native-born criminals to meet the demand for genetic material?

Note that the subject of the above-referenced article is not about what happened in the 1980s, but rather about the cruel Trump administration that has deported Orville Etoria to Eswatini, formerly Swaziland.

What amazes me almost as much as the idea that Americans in the 1980s couldn’t live without being enriched by a convicted criminal’s continued residence is the ability of the U.S. economy to survive Mr. Etoria and millions of similarly situated enrichers. Taxpayers have been funding shelter, food, security, etc. for Mr. Etoria almost every year since at least 1981 when he was first arrested. Taxpayers are continuing to fund shelter, food, and security for Mr. Etoria now that he lives in Eswatini. U.S. taxpayers are also funding migrant-to-migrant interactions, e.g., “Three victims of Florida 18-wheeler U-turn crash ID’d as Haitian immigrants” (New York Post):

The three victims of the Indian immigrant truck driver who made an illegal U-turn across a Florida highway earlier this month have been identified as Haitian immigrants, according to officials.

The driver Herby Dufresne, 30, and passengers Faniola Joseph, 27, and Rodrigue Dor, 53, all Haitian immigrants, were in their minivan when it plowed into the side of an 18-wheeler driven by Harjinder Singh, an immigrant from India, on Aug. 12, the Miami Herald reported.

(I’m not sure what the argument for keeping the enricher Harjinder Singh here in the U.S. was. India is home to 1.45 billion humans, a number that grows every year, and also India is too dangerous for any human to occupy?)

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Send humanoid robots to do crazy stunts?

Today is the 51st anniversary of when the third greatest American tried to jump over the Snake River Canyon, near Twin Falls, Idaho, in a steam-powered motorcycle. I was there back in June.

From the downtown Perrine Bridge, a mound of dirt remains visible:

There is a monument to the third greatest American right at the bridge/visitor center:

A short drive to the east, the mound itself may be examined and there is additional signage:

Evel Knievel’s particular jump was already replicated in 2016 by Eddie Braun:

If Eddie Braun hadn’t recreated this jump, wouldn’t it be awesome to see Tesla’s Optimus, or a similar humanoid robot, piloting a replica Skycycle X-2?

I’m wondering what other stunts could be pulled by humanoid robots. Motorcycle jumps, obviously, but what else would be fun to watch? Maybe after a humanoid robot proves that something can be done a human can follow in his/her/zir/their tracks (don’t want to assume a gender ID for a robot that thinks fast enough to change gender multiple times per second).

(Readers might be wondering who the first and second greatest Americans are. Elvis Presley, of course, is in the #2 slot. Due to Democrats being in majority in the U.S., we must recognize George Floyd as the #1 greatest American ever to have lived. Educate yourself by reading Floyd’s biography, recommended by state-sponsored NPR, if you aren’t familiar with all of George Floyd’s achievements.)

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