Austin and Lockhart, Texas: 10 barbecue restaurants in 72 hours

by philg

On a recent business trip to Austin I resolved to consume 100 percent of my calories at barbecue restaurants.

The trip started with an Uber ride from the airport (the city’s license raj effectively outlawed Uber, but the state legislature brought them back). Traffic was horrific reverse-commuting into the city at 6:30 pm so we had plenty of time to watch folks living under bridges operate their 1980s-style squeegee business. I asked Himmatullah whether there were more homeless in Austin or back in his hometown of Kabul. “There are way more in Austin. Nobody is homeless in Afghanistan.” (As it was a leisurely ride, I learned that Himmatullah returns to Kabul at least once per year and that tickets cost as little as $1,200 round-trip from Houston via Dubai.)

Day 1: dinner at Iron Works BBQ, right across the street from the convention center/Fairmont. Tried brisket (a bit dry), sausage (great), mac/cheese (fair), green beans (limp). The purportedly homemade pecan pie was disappointing, with no apparent connection between the sweet/gluey stuff on the bottom and the pecans on top. I hate to say this, but a local farm near my Boston suburb makes vastly better pecan pie. (See below; this style seems to be what Texans like) Employees did not seem passionate about BBQ. Overall rating: Fair.

Day 2: early lunch at Cooper’s BBQ. Line that got right to the door by 12 was met by an enthusiastic pitmaster. Brisket (much better than Iron Works), Sausage (two varieties; both great), Pork Ribs (tender, not fatty), jalapeno/bacon mac/cheese (“meh” says John; Philip enjoyed it), green beans (not as mushy as at Iron Works; lots of bacon), cole slaw (excellent), salad(!). BBQ sauce is thin and vinegar-y. Pecan pie-ish cobbler: awesome. Lightyears ahead of Iron Works. Overall rating: Superb.

Day 2: dinner at Stubb’s BBQ. Brisket (tender, not as dry as Iron Works, not as much flavor as Cooper’s), sausage (good; Cooper’s was better, but John says “more of a toss-up), fried okra (awesome), mac/cheese (sharper than Iron Works; John preferred to Cooper’s, but Philip was less impressed), pecan pie (similar to Iron Works; pecans on top of flavorless sugar gel), banana pudding (Nilla wafers!). Overall rating: Good.

Day 3, Pilgrimage to Lockhart. Our local guide, Matt Cohen: “Historically, the best Texas BBQ was in small towns – in the days before refrigeration, the local meat market would smoke their leftover fresh cuts to sell the next day. BBQ is still generally sold by the pound for this reason.” We drove at 90 mph in a Chevy Volt down a private toll road (speed limit 85). We were joined by Chris Lamprecht, who flew a Columbia 400 (single-engine piston) from Texas to the southern tip of Argentina.

Day 3, lunch 1: Lockhart. Kreuz market. Brisket. Shoulder. Sausage (moist/soft). Beef rib (somewhat stringy). John’s favorite Mac and cheese; Philip found it bland. Boring green beans (not a lot of bacon like at coopers). Sauerkraut. Skipped dessert. Cavernous and not especially welcoming. Playing Merle Haggard’s “Mama Tried” regarding individual responsibility (I would have been more excited to get customer reaction to his 2008 “Hillary”: “And who kept her head high when it could have been down … changes need to be large / Something like a big switch of gender / Let’s put a woman in charge”). Overall: great, but uninspired barn-like dining room.

Day 3, lunch 2: Black’s in Lockhart. Pork ribs. Brisket (moist and smoky). Sausage jalapeño and cheese. A bit mushy (maybe because it was made fresh and we’re used to supermarket sausage made months earlier?). Mac and cheese (bland, but John’s new favorite) beef ribs (better than Kreuz). Cole slaw (wet). Green beans (bright green and not mushy). Sweet potato pudding. Pecan pie looks like Iron Works: pecans on top of sugar gel. Did not try. Manager, Anthony Hamilton, came out to chat, welcome, us and insist that we try beef ribs (he returned with a sample and they were awesome, much more tender than at Kreuz). Best decor. Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson. Overall rating: Superb.

Day 3: Stroll past the central square.

Day 3, lunch 3: Smitty’s (original Kreuz location in Lockhart). Turkey (moist!), brisket, pork ribs, prime rib, sausage (she specifically asked if we wanted a softer one, almost apologetic for the conventional firm sausage). Mac and cheese and beans. Desserts: not special. Meat and sides come from two different counters and are paid for separately. There are no forks (plastic knives are provided, though, and spoons are available at the sides/desserts counter). Dining area smelled funny. Decor: weak. Verdict: similar style/taste to Kreuz, but inferior venue. Overall rating: Good.

Day 3, lunch 4: Chisholm Trail BBQ in Lockhart: fajita skirt steak awesome. Brisket fair. Sausage fresh and soft. Mac cheese boring (John says not as good as Black’s). Fried okra not nearly as good as Stubb’s. Perhaps made in a batch in the morning and then left under the heat lamp? Pecan pie same style as usual; on top of gel, boring supermarket-style crust. Lemon Meringue pie: good graham cracker crust. Peach cobbler: super sweet. This is where the locals go (partly for the drive-through?) and the staff was the warmest. They also have the largest variety of food, e.g., fried catfish. Overall rating: Good.

We drove back into town just after 3 pm and traffic was intense. Viewed from the hotel window, I-35 was jammed every day from 3-8 pm. We saw a single rider on one of the light rail system‘s $12.5 million cars. The system shuts down at 7 pm on most days after running a total of 18 trips (i.e., the number that the Moscow metro would run on one line in 18 minutes). After we walked up the river a bit, Google Maps showed that it would be 18 minutes to walk back to the Fairmont and 15 minutes to crawl on a surface road. Austin needs a third or fourth dimension for transportation.

Day 4: Cheat with a fruit bowl at the Fairmont and coffee (no milk or sugar) with Jack Long, veteran of three round-the-world PC-12 flights (someone should tell him about the invention of the twin-engine turbojet?).

[Blues Posse interlude, courtesy of J.J. “Jamie” Van Beek, lead singer, harmonica player, and Uber driver to County Line (he’s a fan, but also recommends brisket from the H-E-B Mueller supermarket at 51st and Berkman).]

Day 4, lunch: County Line BBQ, Route 2222 in NW Austin. Homemade bread (awesome; sweet, chewy, and thick). Lean brisket (fair). 2nd cut brisket (moist and delicious). Sausage (firm, good). Beef rib (charred; not as good as Black’s Lockhart). Minimal choice of sides: potato salad, coleslaw, baked potato, beans, salad (no mac and cheese!). Peach cobbler: great and not too sweet. Pecan pie: Nuts-over-glue style, yet somehow better than the others. The gel/glue tasted nuttier and less sweet. The nuts on top were crunchier. We still preferred Cooper’s pecan cobbler. Much more elegant experience than the others: table service (excellent), interesting decor, waterfront location. John gives authenticity bonus for the well-dressed customer getting out of luxury pickup in cowboy hat open-carrying a collectible quality handgun. Overall rating: Great.

Day 4, dinner #1: Terry Black’s, just south of downtown. Superb moist brisket (see below for Ricky cooking the next batch of victims; all that you need is a big stack of wood and 14 hours of time). The most interesting and intense jalapeño cheese sausage. The best of the creamy bland-style Mac and Cheese (pasta was not overcooked, for example). Reasonably crunchy green beans. First butter crust for a pecan pie among the restaurants we tried and overall even better than Cooper’s pecan cobbler. Like a good pastry shop’s pecan pie. The peach cobbler, on the other hand, was gluey and sweet and no better than any of the others that we tried. Overall rating: Superb.

Day 4, dinner #2 (meal #10): Salt Lick BBQ’s outpost at the Austin airport. The best coleslaw so far. Good sausage, though quite peppery. Weak brisket (maybe due to reheating?). Sweet soft bread. Not competitive with County Line’s bread. Overall Rating: Poor.

Conclusion: My taste in mac/cheese is chewier and sharper than what folks in Texas like, i.e., creamy and bland. I am not a Texas BBQ dessert fan. The fruit-based desserts are not generally made with fresh fruit and they taste more like sugar than like fruit. Although we ate enough pecan pie to risk getting a nut rash, we never learned to enjoy what is apparently the classic Texas style of sugar gel topped with pecans.

Philip’s rankings: #1: tie between Black’s in Lockhart and Terry Black’s in Austin. #2: Cooper’s in Austin, with Cooper’s getting a boost for mac/cheese and dessert. #3: Kreuz Market. #4 County Line, with a boost for atmosphere, bread, and riverside location. Honorable mention: Stubb’s for fried okra.

John’s rankings, based on brisket and beef rib: #1: tie between Black’s Lockhart and Terry Black’s in Austin, #2 Kreuz Market, #3 Cooper’s, #4 Smitty’s. Honorable mention: County Line for bread and atmosphere.

Parting messages from the merchants at the airport…

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Celebrating recycling at Logan Airport

by philg

On a recent trip through Logan Airport, I found a celebration of recycling: artwork made from 1500 lbs of collected plastic. This was right in front of de-icing fluid being sprayed on aircraft that will burn 1500 lbs of jet fuel in the first 15 minutes of the climb.

(Folks who are passionate about gender equality will be dismayed to learn that 100 percent of the de-icing workers, who enjoy fresh breezes and freezing rain for much of the winter, seemed to identify as just one gender.)

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NYT: The Monsters are the Men

by philg

“‘The Monsters Are the Men’: Inside a Thriving Sex Trafficking Trade in Florida” (NYT, yesterday):

First, a health inspector spotted several suitcases. Then she noticed an unusual stash of clothing, food and bedding. A young woman who was supposed to be a massage therapist spoke little English and seemed unusually nervous.

The inspector reported her findings to police. They would eventually learn that her suspicions were right: The women were not just employees: They were living in the day spa, sleeping on massage tables and cooking meals on hot plates in the back. Some of them had had their passports confiscated.

Beyond the lurid celebrity connection, however, lies the wretched story of women who police believe were brought from China under false promises of new lives and legitimate spa jobs. Instead, they found themselves trapped in the austere back rooms of strip-mall brothels — trafficking victims trapped among South Florida’s rich and famous.

“I would never consider them prostitutes — it was really a rescue operation,” the sheriff said, training his anger at the men whose demand for sex kept the massage parlors in business. “The monsters are the men,” he added.

So the male customers are “monsters”. What about the folks who actually managed the “human trafficking”? It turns out that they were neither male nor monsters:

Sheriff Snyder said investigators, who worked with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, estimated the trafficking ring to be a $20 million international operation. Men paid between $100 and $200 for sex, the sheriff said; between $2 million and $3 million have been seized in Florida, he said, including a safe stuffed with Rolex watches.

In addition to arresting men ranging in age from their 30s to at least one in his 80s, police charged several women who appeared to be overseeing the operation with racketeering, money laundering and prostitution.

What is the root of the problem?

State Attorney Dave Aronberg of Palm Beach County, whose office leads a human trafficking task force with the F.B.I., said trafficking foreigners to work in places like massage parlors can be more difficult to root out than trafficking, for example, American girls who are recruited in person or online.

So the Times would suggest that we vote for politicians who promise to make it more difficult for people to get into the U.S. (e.g., with a wall along the southern border and restrictions on via tourist and work visas for folks who arrive by air)?

[Note that immigrants in the commercial sex industry are referred to by the Times as “prostitutes,” but when American women work in this industry they are “sex workers” (example).]

Also fun from the front page today: “The Power of a $15 Minimum Wage: Research has found that a living wage is an antidepressant, a sleep aid and a stress reliever. And that’s not all.” (full article) But how is $15/hour a “living wage”? A full-time worker would need to earn closer to $45/hour to be over the income limit for subsidized public housing in NYC (family of 4) and maybe $50/hour to pay for Obamacare insurance without a taxpayer subsidy. The article opens with a young immigrant from Guatemala who has earned permanent residency (Green Card), but whose skills are insufficient to command more than minimum wage. What will happen to him when he is older and less productive and it is illegal for anyone to hire him at less than $20 or $25/hour (or whatever the minimum wage is then)? The photo shows that he is well on his way to obesity and type 2 diabetes. SSDI?

Related:

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Marie Kondo ignores the Digital Age

by philg

Friends in Manhattan had two(!) copies of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondo, in their apartment and gave me one.

Kondo herself says that one of the best things to do with a gift is throw it out:

The true purpose of a present is to be received. Presents are not ‘things’ but a means for conveying someone’s feelings. … Just thank it for the joy it gave you when you first received it. … When you throw it away, you do so for the sake of the giver too.

I love almost everything Japanese (except dessert!) so I read the book (big print, double-spaced, so it takes only about one hour for a first read-through).

One thing that jumped out at me is that the book, first published in 2010, barely mentions the Digital Age in which we live. She talks about tidying up CDs, but does not note that 500 at a time can be ripped to a thumb drive. She talks about discarding some papers, keeping other critical ones, and putting receipts in a special place in her house. Why not scan? Is it because that just turns household clutter into C: drive clutter? Or because Marie Kondo hasn’t done any work with scanner?

Maybe she ignores the digital because Kondo is so in love with the physical. For someone who motivates people to throw out what must be millions of lbs. of usable stuff annually, she is herself far more devoted to stuff that the average person:

I began to treat my belongings as if they were alive when I was a high school student. … I can think of no greater happiness in life than to be surrounded only by the things I love. … All you need to do is get rid of anything that doesn’t touch your heart like this. There is no simpler way to contentment.

When you treat your belongings well, they will always respond in kind. For this reason, I take time to ask myself occasionally whether the storage space I’ve set aside for them will make them happy. Storage, after all, is the sacred act of choosing a home for my belongings.

[Your typical Cessna or Cirrus is probably pretty miserable, then, in its aging prefab T-hangar or merely tied down on the ramp!]

When she comes home she talks to the house, says “Thank you very much of your hard work,” to her shoes, “Good job!” to her jacket and dress, and tells her (emptied) handbag “You did well. Have a good rest.”

More: Read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, by Marie Kondo.

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Commercial sex in Florida then and now

by philg

From “Life as a carrier-based pilot in World War II” (2017 post about a British pilot’s memoir):

After a quiet drinking session one night at the Battle House Hotel in Mobile, we decided at midnight that it was time we started to wend our way back to the station, using the method by which we had come—hitch-hiking. The four of us stood on the pavement of the main street, in the direction of Pensacola, and waved our thumbs. A big open Oldsmobile cruised to a standstill. ‘Pensacola, boys? OK, climb aboard!’ The driver, a man of about 45 years of age, was cheerful—nay, downright jovial. This was not surprising considering the amount of alcohol he seemed to have put away. His joviality was somewhat blurred and his driving slightly erratic. He crawled along for a minute or two, then stopped again. ‘Hey! Any o’ you fellers want a piece of ass before we get going? On me, boys—my treat. How’s about it?’ What on earth was a ‘piece of ass’? We looked dumb—he thought so, too. ‘You Limeys don’t know what a piece of ass is? You don’t want a jump? Hell! You know! A woman! A good whore! How’s about it?’ To a man we declined. His opinion of Limeys had hit an all-time low. What sort of fellers were these? ‘Well, I’m having me a blow-through before I leave town. Only keep you waiting ten minutes, boys. Hey! Officer!’ (This to a policeman, patrolling the street.) ‘Hey! Officer! Where’s the nearest whorehouse?’ The policeman wasn’t at all put out by the request, the inflammable breath or the bleary bloodshot eyes. ‘Second left, third house on the left. Good house, too. OK?’ We drove down. He pulled up the car with a screech of brakes outside the brothel; a good-looking three-storey house in a nice enough district. ‘Sure you won’t join me in a piece of ass, boys? Round your evening off nicely.’ He leered. Then he stood up in the car. ‘Hey! Mother! Bring out your whores! Bring out your whores!’ He was bawling at the top of his voice. ‘Goddammit! Woman! Bring out them whores, for Chrissake!!’ I wondered how much longer he would create a disturbance before someone did something about it. Then suddenly a first-floor window opened. A middle-aged woman, hair in curlers, stuck out her head. Her voice was equally refined. ‘Now you just git the hell out o’ this. My girls have had a long, hard day and they’re all tuckered out! Git the hell out of it!’ ‘Ah! The hell! You just git them whores o’ yours down again and open this goddam door! I’ve bin pinin’ for a piece of ass for the last two hours and I just ain’t goin’ home!’ ‘Mister, you can just fuck off. All my gals are in bed and you ain’t gonna see one of ’em!’

Florida was already home to, um, gentlemen’s clubs:

Pettigrew and I were at the Villa Venice, one of the better night-clubs on the Beach, with a very good, well-dressed floor show. We had sat through two shows but Jim, whose whole world revolved round girlies, insisted on seeing the third and last performance. … The last show gave him his chance, for the girls appeared clad only in wonderful head-dresses, gauntlets, high-heeled shoes and G-strings. Jim shook me back to life. ‘They’re on.’ So they were. And Jim was right—she was a honey. Blonde, about 19; and everything came out and went back again in exactly the right places. She smiled at him and made his day. We were cold and shivering outside, despite our greatcoats. … Eventually she emerged, looking lovely enough to eat. Her hair under the lamplight was beautiful. She wore a mink coat which she must have earned the hard way. Her legs beneath it were the pride of Florida. As Jim moved towards her, she declaimed—from 20 yards, in a rasping voice which can’t have done a thing for Jim’s ego: ‘It’ll cost you 30 bucks!’ It must have been a hard life for a high-kicker in Miami. ‘Thirty bucks?’ said Jim, incredulously. ‘Thirty bucks? Jesus! I only want to borrow it, not buy it!’ She swept past us with a look of contempt. Her perfume and the swish of her mink wafted over me. Strange things, girls, I thought. And how bloody awful to be so hard at 19! Already she must be sick to death of men. She isn’t young any more. Boys, young men, have been left far behind, and the wallets of the well-to-do—men of any age, shape or colour—are her only interest.

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Harvard graduate discovers that the suburbs are packed with narrow-minded white heterosexuals

by philg

The old white guy who led the First Parish church in our suburban town (Lincoln, Massachusetts), a union of Congregational and Unitarian, retired. The Millionaires for Obama on the church hiring committee found Manish Mishra-Marzetti, a young Indian-American (Indian from India, not Indian like Elizabeth Warren) to become the new minister (in 2015). He, his husband, and their two adopted kids (characterized as “African American” in the video link below) moved into our midst.

On paper, at least, this guy is exactly the kind of person that the residents say that they want to assist and/or get to know better. He’s the child of immigrants. His skin is nearly as dark as a Virginia Democrat headed out for a party. He identifies as LGBTQIA. He organized trips to our southern border to assist migrants. He sermonized against the evils of Trump and Trump supporters.

In a YouTube talk, he tells the story of playground interactions with the soccer moms. Spoiler alert: He bailed out on our boring suburb and moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan. This can’t be because he didn’t want to pay the 30-percent property tax increase (we are demonstrating our commitment to environmentalism by bulldozing a 140,000-square-foot school, having trailers trucked in to house students for three years, and constructing an identical-sized school on the same spot (full story); at $110 million and considered per-town-resident-student, this will be the most expensive school ever built in the United States). As pastor, he received free housing from the church and I don’t think that the church-owned house was subject to property taxation.

Watch the video (start at 8:30 if you’re pressed for time) and see what the Harvard Divinity School graduate learned!

The video made the rounds on our town’s mailing list. Some excerpts from the Millionaires Who Hate Trump (formerly the Millionaires for Obama):

Where is the outrage? The outrage each and every one of us should feel that we are the cause of this man and his family moving half way across the country so they could feel welcome!

Being black in America is dangerous, especially these days. Being a woman in America is dangerous as well. Being a Muslim is dangerous. Being any person of color… Being poor and homeless is dangerous as well – and there are homeless in the suburbs, even [Happy Valley].

When we were in our adoption classes years ago, one lesson I heard there and have learned over and over again is that if our children say they are being discriminated against, we had best believe them. For those of us that are members of the dominant society, it is not possible to fully recognize all the nuances of racism.

It’s unfortunate that the First Parish could be blamed for Manish’s
unhappiness, because they extended an invitation to him and his
non-traditional family, which other organizations might have denied. [i.e., because it was two daddies and two adopted children, this guy should have been grateful for the job because the rest of the country is even more hostile to gay multi-racial families? Where is the evidence that other Americans are yet more racist?]

it’s awesome how open and welcoming Ann Arbor has been, guess I need to check my own prejudgment of the general Midwest! [the minister’s new job, mentioned favorably in the video, is in Ann Arbor; folks here know so much about the rest of the U.S. that they assume Ann Arbor is solid MAGA land! (the square around Ann Arbor voted overwhelmingly for Hillary Clinton in 2016)]

He talks about his children which is a difficult issue for a male parent. [What better way to show one’s lack of prejudice than to assert that men are inferior at handling the challenge of talking about children?]

The perceived’symbolic moat around our Town should be a wake-up call that I hope our Town leaders will address. Perhaps the [Board of Selects] might consider forming a Task Force on Ethnic and Gender Diversity and Inclusion in [Happy Valley]. The enormous amount of money we are spending on a school building will not make a “school” unless we teach the values of embracing differences to both parents and children in school and outside in “playgroups”.

As a person of color [who let her in?!?], I am quite tired of “seeing the intent” of my fellow citizens, and having to assume the best of them every time I’m asked where I’m from (or even “where my people are from” if I don’t play along nicely. Even in the [Happy Valley] post office I was asked if I was from Outer Mongolia. Hey, I’m from New Jersey.) I’ve spent a lifetime of assuming the best of people when they make me feel like “other.” Maybe it’s time for the majority to take a deeper look at their own biases and presumptions. Please don’t whitesplain Manish.

Do you know how many times I’ve been asked where I’m from? Exactly zero. Because I’m white. It’s not difficult to understand how a question like that, given our society’s history, could bother a person of color who not only has to field the question frequently but recognizes that the question often comes with undertones of “do you belong here?” [You belong if you want to spend $250,000 per town-resident student on a renovated school!]

I cannot convey enough how valuable this book has been for me. Everyone can get something from it. White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo [I don’t think it addresses how whites should deal with the fact that average white IQ and income is lower than average Asian-American IQ and income]

Speaking as a woman who was an international athlete in the 70’s and who suffered greatly from the negative assumptions then prevailing about physically strong women and the privileges available to male athletes which were denied to women, I can attest that although times have changed for the better, I still see anti-female intent in events where others don’t necessarily see it. The Kavanaugh interviews were a good example.

[From a guy with an Indian-sounding name] Most (All!) immigrants are vulnerable. On some difficult circumstances they had to leave their native country. They are looking for support and help. [Maybe the U.S. could set up a program where an immigrant who wants support and help could get free housing, food, health insurance, and smarthphone from the government? To be funded by taxes on the native-born…] Hence an immigrant can feel intimidated by seemingly unfriendly questions. … The color of skin adds another layer of sensitivity. Here it is a function of profiling the person as less intelligent or of lower character. I observe this as a cultural issue in the US because of the history. Because of my own skin tone, i have faced such individuals.

On Sunday afternoon, over a hundred people gathered [at the church] for a facilitated workshop and discussion of our reactions to the video. … The First Parish, founded in the New England tradition of individual thought and conscience, is a democracy. [I wonder how long a member would last after expressing the individual thought that Donald Trump would make a better president than Hillary Clinton!] Many people who thought they had gone out of their way to welcome Manish and his family to the church and to [Happy Valley] are disappointed by their failure to make that welcome fully understood. [The white say-gooder (few actually take action and rise to the level of “do-gooder”) is doomed to be misunderstood] We do need to take a careful look at who we are and who we appear to be when we deal with newcomers and people who feel like outsiders. [i.e., the problem is mostly the appearance of white narrow-mindedness]

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Prostitution next to the Outback Steakhouse… and it is Trump’s fault

by philg

Here’s a story for New Englanders… “Patriots Owner Robert Kraft Charged in Florida Prostitution Sting” (nytimes):

Robert K. Kraft, the billionaire owner of the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, was charged Friday with two counts of soliciting sex as part of a wide-ranging investigation into prostitution and human trafficking in South Florida.

The charges against Mr. Kraft, 77, came after the police in Jupiter, Fla., used video surveillance to observe activity inside several day spas and massage parlors.

One of the most powerful owners in American sports, he is a leading voice in the N.F.L.’s small fraternity of billionaire owners, a member of the committee that sets Commissioner Roger Goodell’s salary, and a friend and political benefactor of President Trump.

All of the sexual encounters that have resulted in charges were videotaped as part of the investigation, the police said.

Mr. Kraft was said to have patronized a spa called Orchids of Asia in Jupiter … The mall, anchored on one end by an Outback Steakhouse,

NYT readers express the appropriate amount of outrage in the comments. A few do ask, essentially, “If the guy has a Gulfstream, why doesn’t he go to a place where prostitution is legal?”

Plainly this is Donald Trump’s fault, somehow, but if the accusation is “human trafficking” could it be that Trump’s proposed tightening of undocumented immigration would actually reduce the number of brothels next to Outbacks? The managers of Mustang Ranch cannot sponsor H-1B visas on the grounds that the job is a “specialty occupation requiring a bachelor’s degree,” can they?

Related:

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How would the Wall work through Big Bend National Park?

by philg

The U.S.-Mexico border is 1,954 miles long, of which 580 miles was fenced (not “walled”!) prior to Donald Trump taking office (Wikipedia). That leaves 1,374 miles of proposed new barrier (immoral “wall” if built by Trump; moral “fence” if built by others?). Of those 1,374 miles, 118 miles are part of Big Bend National Park.

Reading The Line Becomes a River, by a former Border Patrol agent (2008-2012), made me wonder how Trump’s proposed barrier can work along this part of the border. Some excerpts:

On a hot Texas evening at the edge of Big Bend National Park, I watched a man ride his horse across the Rio Grande.

I gestured at the village across the river and asked the man if he lived in Boquillas. Of course, he said, beaming with pride. I asked what he did for work and he nodded at the unattended souvenirs and handmade crafts that had been set out atop the rocks. No hay trabajo, he complained—we make our money from tourists. I asked if many Americans crossed over to visit. Sure, he said, Boquillas is very safe. Narcos don’t bother us, even the rangers and la migra leave us alone. He paused. You know, he said, there’s a nice restaurant in my village. Is there breakfast? I asked. Of course, he smiled. I’ll come for you in the morning.

The next morning, as the sun grew pale and white in the eastern sky, I met my guide at the banks of the river. He instructed me to climb onto his horse, and then, like it was nothing, he spurred the animal across the river into Mexico. We spoke little as I jostled atop sauntering haunches and grasped at the back of his saddle. Passing the first cinderblock homes of Boquillas, I considered the extent to which my safekeeping depended upon this stranger, leading me into the silent and unfamiliar streets of his village.

Our young fit fluent-in-Spanish half-Mexican hero bravely makes a trip that, during my visit to Big Bend, was mostly being taken by senior citizens after exiting from their RVs. The “river” is more like a wide shallow stream at this point in its course. Neither the U.S. nor Mexico was bothering to do any border control at the border. In the case of the U.S., there were checkpoints across the roads about 50 miles north. I enjoyed my time in Boquillas, especially the town’s dusty museum (unattended by any guard; pay into a box via the honor system).

The National Park Service now has an official guide to visiting Boquillas. It seems that the ability to walk to Boquillas and get a taco was one of the freedoms we supposed lost after 9/11 (Wikipedia; except that the author made it across easily!), but since 2013 (Wikipedia) there is a formal border crossing.

I wonder how Trump’s political promise can be implemented in this part of the country. Here are some possibilities:

  • Despite the idea that national parks are supposed to be mostly natural, we install an ugly fence along our side of the river. It will appear in every visitor’s snapshots from Big Bend.
  • We build a fence on the north edge of the park, with checkpoints at the handful of roads that would cross the fence. Any caravan of migrants that has made its way to Mexico City can ride a bus for another 18 hours, get off in Boquillas, walk across the Rio Grande and tell the nearest park ranger “I am seeking asylum” (or give birth to a baby who will then be entitled to bring the parents in 18 years from now, thus saddling U.S. taxpayers with the cost of public housing, health care, food stamps, etc., for the now-older parents)
  • We pay the Mexicans to build a monster fence somewhere on their side of the border, out of sight of the tourists who come to Big Bend (but the Mexicans have their own state park on their side).

Is there any other alternative that is consistent with Trump’s campaign promise?

[Also, given that it is easy to walk into the U.S. at Big Bend, why aren’t migrant caravans choosing this route right now? Why wait near the border in Tijuana, for example, when one could just as easily be over the border and on one’s way from Big Bend?]

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While you’re watching the cable box, the cable box is watching you…

by philg

Our Verizon FiOS service was beginning to flake out, though could usually be restored by power-cycling the router. I decided that it was time to upgrade to Gbit service so I called up the friendly sales folks to sign up for a new package.

“Let me see what channels you watch,” said the agent. “Oh! Your favorite is NBC?” He sounded surprised. Other than watching the last five minutes of the Super Bowl (one hour of clock time?), we hadn’t turned on the TV since an attempt to tape “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”

In other words, the agent knew what we watched and how much we watched, presumably from cable box data.

Is it common knowledge that TV viewing habits are not private in a cableized world? Why aren’t folks who say that Donald Trump is establishing a dictatorship concerned? Wouldn’t it be straightforward to use cable company data to find those who #Resist (e.g., by refusing to watch Fox News) and send them to concentration camps?

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The Line Becomes a River: Birthright citizenship is the root of the fight over family separation

by philg

The Line Becomes a River is by a guy who worked as a Border Patrol agent between 2008 and 2012. He is outraged by U.S. policies that result in families of migrants being separated:

No father should be kept from his family this way, no father should have a young son and wake up unable to hear him in the next room.

A big portion of the book concerns two undocumented immigrants whose children were born on U.S. soil. Due to “birthright citizenship,” the children are U.S. citizens despite the illegal status of their parents. When the father is caught and deported, the parents decide that the children and mother need to remain in the U.S. so that the children can have maximum opportunity (and once the 15-year-old turns 18 he can sponsor his dad by right for a Green Card).

From Mom to the immigration bureaucrats:

Lupe wrote in Spanish on lined school paper borrowed from her children: I Lupe Balderas declare that José Martínez-Cruz is my husband since the year 1999. We have 3 boys age 15, 10, and 8. … now we miss him very much because I Lupe cannot take my boys to the park because lately I have been unwell. My husband took my boys to play soccer every Wednesday and on weekends he dedicated his time to us to eat and go out and now we miss him. My husband has given sixteen years of happiness and love to my sons and me but we won’t return to Mexico because my boys don’t know anyone there and they speak very little Spanish and it’s very difficult to adapt to another country when their whole life has been here they were born here and they are growing here. For us as parents we want the best for our sons Diego, José Junior, and Vicente. … we give hope to God that very soon we will be together because God does not like to see his children separated.

From a son:

Hi I’m Diego Martínez I’m the son of José Martínez I’m his oldest son I am 15 years old. I have two younger brothers. One is 10 and the other is 8. I’m working to keep my brothers happy to buy them what they want to keep them happy. Well my dad José is the nicest guy I know my dad is like my best friend and my father. I treat my dad with so much respect he’s the father any kid would want to have. My mom and my whole family broke down when we saw him at court on the first court he had everyone started crying. … I miss my dad he knew how to cheer us up when we were down. He took us to the park on Monday and Wednesday to play soccer with our church friend he got along with everyone at church my dad was the coolest person most nicest, most religious, most caring person always made my mom happy, always putting a smile in our faces every single day he’s also very smart and very funny. … How I feel right now about my dad being in jail and seeing him like this makes me really sad depressed my father isn’t here with us everyone that asks me about my dad makes me sad to say he’s in jail. My heart kinda stops pauses and breaks down on every letter they send him he was a man with three children and one woman. Each one of my friends I’ve had for many years loved my dad because he took us to places like to any place appropriate, to mountains in the west to parks to many places in the city. My dad did anything to make us happy now my life is depressing hollow my dad’s not here. A missing place for him here waits.

Thanks to modern telecommunications and transportation, the family can talk 24/7 and actually get together regularly:

I asked Lupe about the boys and she told me that an uncle with papers had offered to take them across the border so they could see their father.

A week later I checked in again with Lupe. Did the boys see José? I asked. Yes, she said, but not Vicente. He just got his arm put in a cast. He’s a little sad, she explained, he hasn’t seen his daddy since he was in court. Lupe told me that José was still at the border, that he planned to cross again soon, maybe this weekend, that everything was fine, that he told her not to worry.

I wanted to confess to her that I wished I had the courage to smuggle José myself, to ferry him safely through the desert, past the sensors and watchtowers, past the agents patrolling distant trails and dirt roads, past the highway checkpoints.

From the father:

For a while, you know, a couple months ago, after I had tried to cross again and again, I finally started to think that maybe my family could come live in Mexico until Lupe and I could arrange our papers. I even mentioned it to the boys on the phone. We don’t want to live in Mexico, they told me. We don’t know anyone there. We like it here, they said, we like our school.

When Lupe and I went to get married, the pastor told us that it was important to grow a family, that it was important for children to see their parents together. Es de mucho valor una familia unida. Family should stay together. If I must stay in Mexico and my wife raises my boys alone, they will be getting less care, less love, and so the family will slowly deteriorate. Being a parent is a job that you share, it’s a job you have to be present for.

Some politicians in the United States think that if a mother or father is deported, this will cause the entire family to move back to Mexico. But in fact, the mothers and fathers with the best family values will want their family to stay in the U.S., they will cross the border again and again to be with them.

If I am arrested crossing the border, I understand it’s part of the system. I realize that I am crossing illegally. But it’s complicated, you see. I know I’m breaking the rules, but it is necessary because my family is there. I don’t want to cause harm to the country, but I have to break the law. I have to. Es una necesidad. It is a situation of emotion, of love. Those who accept staying apart from their family are without love. Their children grow up without love. So I must fight against this.

I don’t want to carry drugs across the desert, I don’t want to get myself into more problems, but sometimes it’s not a choice. The same people who control the drug smuggling control the human trafficking, so in some places if you want to get across, you have to carry a load.

To be honest, I would rather be in prison in the U.S. and see my boys once a week through the glass than to stay here and be separated from my family. At least I would be closer to them. So you see, there is nothing that can keep me from crossing. My boys are not dogs to be abandoned in the street. I will walk through the desert for five days, eight days, ten days, whatever it takes to be with them. I’ll eat grass, I’ll eat bushes, I’ll eat cactus, I’ll drink filthy cattle water, I’ll drink nothing at all. I’ll run and hide from la migra, I’ll pay the mafias whatever I have to. They can take my money, they can rob my family, they can lock me away, but I will keep coming back. I will keep crossing, again and again, until I make it, until I am together again with my family. No, no me quedo aquí. Voy a seguir intentando pasar.

The final paragraph above is actually the last paragraph of the book, prior to a brief Epilogue.

The book reveals what I think is a fundamental contradiction in our laws occasioned by birthright citizenship. We cannot bear the idea of the federal government separating families. At the same time, we won’t simply allow anyone who claims to be the parent of a minor child to enter and stay in the U.S. forever. If the child is a U.S. citizen, however, there is no way to implement our stated values. We cannot deport the child. We insist on deporting the parent. But we also insist that the federal government should never separate parents from children.

[Separately, the author is a product of U.S. state government separation of parents from children via our no-fault divorce laws. His mom has been through family court so many times that the author thanks “three fathers” in the Acknowledgments. Mom of author did not meet her own father until she reached the age of 17. Until that age, the only contact that she had with her mother’s former partner was a photograph. Like Elizabeth Warren, Americans are eager to see children separated from one parent in the event that an American adult wants to have sex with some new friends (and will offer significant cash incentives for this behavior), but they’re inconsolable if children are separated from one or both parents in the event that a parent is detained and/or deported.]

Helicopter enthusiasts and Airbus salespeople will appreciate The Line Becomes a River. Whenever there is a need for transportation, a Border Patrol Eurocopter spins up. It might be a dehydrated migrant. It might be looking for a corpse in the desert.

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