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Chicago Tribune
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Today in History: Pakistan gains independence
Today is Thursday, Aug. 14, the 226th day of 2025. There are 139 days left in the year. Today in history: On Aug. 14, 1947, Pakistan gained independence from British rule. Also on this date: In 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law, ensuring income for elderly Americans and creating a federal unemployment insurance program. In 1936, in front of an estimated 20,000 spectators, Rainey Bethea was hanged in Owensboro, Kentucky in the last public execution in the United States. In 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill signed the Atlantic Charter, which detailed the post-war goals of the two nations. In 1945, President Harry S. Truman announced that Imperial Japan had surrendered unconditionally, ending World War II. In 1994, Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, the terrorist known as 'Carlos the Jackal,' was captured by French agents in Sudan. In 1995, Shannon Faulkner officially became the first female cadet in the history of The Citadel, South Carolina's state military college. (However, Faulkner withdrew from the school less than a week later, citing the stress of her court fight, and her isolation among the male cadets.) In 1997, an unrepentant Timothy McVeigh was formally sentenced to death for the Oklahoma City bombing. (McVeigh was executed by lethal injection in 2001.) In 2009, Charles Manson follower Lynette 'Squeaky' Fromme, 60, convicted of trying to assassinate President Gerald Ford in 1975, was released from a Texas prison hospital after more than three decades behind bars. In 2016, Usain Bolt became the first athlete to win the 100m dash in three consecutive Olympics, taking gold at the Summer Games in Rio. In 2021, a 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck Haiti, turning thousands of structures into rubble; the quake left more than 2,200 people dead and injured more than 12,000 others. Today's Birthdays: Broadway lyricist Lee Adams ('Bye Bye Birdie') is 101. College Football Hall of Famer and NFL quarterback John Brodie is 90. Singer Dash Crofts is 85. Country singer Connie Smith is 84. Comedian-actor Steve Martin is 80. Film director Wim Wenders is 80. Singer-musician Larry Graham is 79. Actor Susan Saint James is 79. Author Danielle Steel is 78. 'Far Side' cartoonist Gary Larson is 75. Actor Carl Lumbly is 74. Olympic gold medal swimmer Debbie Meyer is 73. Actor Jackee Harry is 69. NASCAR Hall of Famer Rusty Wallace is 69. Actor Marcia Gay Harden is 66. Basketball Hall of Famer Earvin 'Magic' Johnson is 66. Singer Sarah Brightman is 65. Actor Susan Olsen (TV: 'The Brady Bunch') is 64. Actor Halle Berry is 59. Golfer Darren Clarke is 57. Actor Catherine Bell is 57. Actor Mila Kunis is 42. Actor Lamorne Morris is 42. Former NFL player Tim Tebow is 38. Actor Marsai Martin is 21.
Boston Globe
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Demetri Martin is trying out something new on his latest tour: live drawing
'It's a game to me, and what's cool is that when I add my words to my drawing, it becomes activated differently,' Martin says. Advertisement On this tour, Martin also continues his quest for concision, with what may be his shortest joke yet: 'Fish fish,' a comment on the idea that aquatic creatures hunt and eat their seafaring brethren. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up (He confesses that his drive for efficient jokes — 'remove, remove' is his credo — is a challenge for filling an hour. 'It's not a great game, because I'm just making it harder on myself,' he says.) It's all in keeping with the man who once joked, 'Sometimes I think I overthink things. But other times I ask myself, 'Do I?'' Growing up on the Jersey Shore, Martin, 52, felt out of place in the macho, sports-driven world. 'I was the weird one,' says Martin, whose cerebral but silly one-liners often call to mind the sensibility of his early influences Steven Wright and 'Far Side' cartoonist Gary Larson. Advertisement 'I liked drawing and I was on the math team. I liked poetry and guitar,' he says. 'No one was doing that in my family or showing me those things.' The teenage Martin also found validation in puzzle books, which both suited and shaped his brain. 'I think somehow that became joke writing for me once I got into comedy,' he said in a recent video interview. 'When I watched comedy, I liked predicting punch lines — they were like puzzles for me.' Martin's solving skills also propelled him to Yale University, where he wrote Planning to become a lawyer, he earned a seat at Harvard Law but then switched to New York University for a full scholarship, only to drop out after two years to pursue stand-up. His breakthrough came in 2003 when his one-man show, 'If I,' won an award at Edinburgh Fringe. It showed off his quirky intellectual humor, but it also included more personal musings. Doing a nightly show about himself was too much. 'I couldn't handle that,' he reflects. 'With my one-liners, even if there's a personal connection, the jokes mean I'm at least one step removed from them.' (This reserve is why he is 'one of six comedians in America without a podcast' as he explains on this tour.) While he built his stand-up career, he wrote for ' Advertisement The show also taught him discipline and the need to find different twists and structures. 'It was like joke-writing boot camp,' he says. 'I learned to try to stay a step ahead of the audience.' That often means staring at a joke or drawing, saying, 'What am I missing?' 'My wife always teases me, because I say that so much it's like a weird mantra — it's the existential thing, but also just asking: Why can't I figure this out? It must be right in front of me.' Martin works constantly on new material, in part because he has learned that when he doesn't, rust accumulates and can be hard to shake, but also because his brain is always revving on high. 'I was at a dinner party once and said, 'I wouldn't say I'm tortured' and my wife started laughing. I meant I'm not depressed,' Martin recalls. 'But she said, 'Your brain is a non-stop barrage and you can't stop.'' But he argues that comedy has helped him embrace that. 'I direct the stream into something positive and productive by writing jokes — I get to have a job but also prevent my thoughts from turning back on me and analyzing this and that.' When those deadpan jokes take a second or longer to land, it can be tough to tell if they worked. At a recent show in Brooklyn, he did a bit about realizing all phone numbers having a negative number in it. The crowd didn't respond much and Martin backed away. When I mentioned that it would be helped by an actual example, he said he usually does it that way: 'When I try to give people my number, I say it's 240, negative 3567 or whatever. But last night I got discouraged so I didn't do the tag. But I should.' Advertisement After that show, I overheard a group of friends walking together and recounting his jokes, still processing some of them. 'It's comforting to hear that,' Martin says, explaining that he forgets that his jokes can take time to process and so he's sometimes thrown off when people don't laugh in the moment. Martin still likes challenging himself. 'I'm still searching for different games I can play,' he says, like drawing live on stage for this tour. He sometimes accompanies his jokes with his guitar, finding witticisms that are enhanced by the combo, either because they fit the rhythm or are propelled more by the music and sometimes will try finding jokes that work while accompanied by minor chords. His new tour begins with him offstage, doing a longer, more conceptual joke than most Martin material: He encourages the audience to prepare for comedy by closing their eyes and relaxing; he adopts the soothing tones of a meditation coach but undercuts every bit of instruction by working in an analogy to something connected to the chaos of modern life in America. 'That was a fun experiment,' he says. 'I really think comedy is an art. And the stage is such a great canvas. It's such an opportunity to have a direct conversation with the people who've come to see you.' Advertisement DEMETRI MARTIN At the Wilbur, June 28, 7 p.m. and 9:45 p.m. 246 Tremont St., Boston.
Forbes
15-04-2025
- Business
- Forbes
China Wins As Trump Torches U.S. Treasuries In Real Time
getty On a recent New York-Tokyo flight, I bumped into a former Bank of Japan official. A senior, battle-tested one who'd ostensibly seen it all. He was on the job amid the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Russia's default in 1998, the Lehman Brothers crash in 2008, the 'taper tantrum' of 2013, the Donald Trump 1.0 era and Covid-19. Naturally, I asked him what he made of the Trump 2.0 trade war shaking up Asia. 'I keep thinking of the Far Side,' he quipped, referring to Gary Larson's anthropomorphic comic strip of old. One in particular, he said, depicting airline pilots warning their 300 passengers of turbulence to come. In the next panel, we see that the pilots are swinging the yoke wildly back and forth, creating havoc for fun. 'We're all on that plane now, with Trump at the controls creating chaos for his amusement,' he said. 'But Asia sure isn't amused.' Neither are bond investors, which only means more Trumpian turbulence everywhere. Self-inflicted, too, which is generating a sense of betrayal among Asian central banks that have long been the core of Washington's ability to live beyond its means. Year after year, decade after decade, officials in Tokyo, Beijing, Seoul and beyond dutifully bought U.S. Treasury securities. That's now changing. Investors everywhere are questioning the idea that U.S. government debt is still special and immune to the laws of financial gravity. Trump has, in short order, threatened the sanctity of U.S. government debt. That has governments from Japan to China to Germany wondering about the safety of vast amounts of public savings. For years now, a succession of American governments took for granted Asian demand for Treasuries. Trump, though, is the first U.S. leader to try the patience of Asian central banks in direct terms. That itself raises questions about this White House's interest in global stability. Aside from the policy volatility, underlying fundamentals raise their own questions. The U.S. national debt is approaching $37 trillion at a moment when Team Trump is angling for more tax cuts and neutering the Internal Revenue Service. Trump's tariff policies, meanwhile, threaten to send inflation skyrocketing. This has Trump on something of a war footing with the Federal Reserve. Trump wants Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to cut rates. Powell argues inflation is too uncomfortably high to lower rates. The schizophrenic policy shifts are really spooking investors, too. Trump's tariffs on China alone have gone from 10% to 145% in the space of a few weeks. Are they going even higher? Lower? It's anyone's guess. If you're a CEO anywhere who was uncertain last month about hiring, hiking wages, making investments or taking a risk on a new product or strategy, you're now even less inclined now to do any of these things. And if you're an Asian central bank official worried about holding U.S. Treasuries, the impulse to buy more is dwindling by the minute. But what of large-scale selling? Any whiff that Japan might trim its nearly $1.1 trillion of Treasuries could devastate global credit markets. The same with Beijing dumping large blocks of its $760 billion of U.S. government debt. Last week, markets were awash in rumors that the Bank of Japan, People's Bank of China or one Asian monetary authority or another might be reducing exposure to Trump's policy chaos. Suffice to say, the most tantalizing financial data in coming weeks will be on central banks' reserve holdings. It's not that simple, of course. News that officials in Japan, China, South Korea, Taiwan, India or elsewhere are selling dollars could send U.S. yields sharply higher. That could destabilize the global financial system in unprecedented ways. Aside from the carnage in markets, the shockwaves could have U.S. consumers closing their wallets. It's possible that the losses Asian governments might suffer from Treasuries are preferable to a global crisis that makes 2008 seem tame by comparison. Indeed, Japanese officials say they're not planning on using U.S. debt as a tariff retaliation tool. Yet if China went that route, BOJ officials would face some very uncomfortable decisions and trade-offs. Particularly with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba gearing up for bilateral trade talks with Team Trump. These risks make Powell's job even harder, too. If he cuts interest rates to make Trump happy, inflation could shoot higher and damage trust in the dollar. Inflation risks are also intensifying thanks to Trump's tariffs. The Fed losing control over inflation could greatly reduce demand for U.S. Treasuries. Trump's designs on changing the Fed's mandate to pressure Powell's board to cut rates could end up doing the same. One doesn't need to indulge in conspiracy theories to worry that China might shun Treasuries. The more Washington's profligate fiscal policies collide with Trump's chaos, the more America's last AAA credit rating could be in trouble. The silence from Moody's Investors Service, the last to assign the U.S. a top rating, is deafening. The same goes for S&P Global and Fitch Ratings, both of which rate the U.S. economy AA+. Yet as Trump wreaks havoc with the U.S. markets, China gets to look like a pillar of strength, stability and, yes, capitalism. Just one more way Trump's self-defeating trade war is making China's ambitions of economic dominance great again.
