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San Francisco Chronicle
23-05-2025
- Business
- San Francisco Chronicle
City College of San Francisco poised to select outsider as chancellor over interim chief
Veteran educator Carlos Osvaldo Cortez is expected to be named next week as the 11th chancellor in 13 years to lead the financially troubled City College of San Francisco, edging out the interim chancellor, the Chronicle has learned. The seven trustees are in contract negotiations with Cortez, and a majority favor him over Interim Chancellor Mitch Bailey, said knowledgeable sources who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the matter. Bailey has fallen out of favor with the faculty union, which strongly influences the majority on the seven-member board of trustees. The chancellor selection echoes a constant debate at City College over the best approach to restoring the college to good fiscal health and increasing enrollment. The faculty union and its supporters on the board want to dip into reserves to boost spending, saying this approach is the best way to attract more students. By contrast, Bailey says he wants to 'adjust college operations to align with current resources,' a practice that matches expectations of accreditors and state officials. The college has been under an accreditation warning sanction over its governance and finances since early 2024. Chancellor selections are secretive, with deliberations happening behind closed doors. At City College, they are a near-annual ritual. If approved, possibly at the May 29 board meeting, Cortez would become the school's fifth permanent head since 2012. There have been six interim chancellors during that time. The selection of Cortez over Bailey would be the second time in a year that the trustees have replaced a chancellor who sought greater financial stability by aligning spending with revenue. Cortez is seen as faculty-friendly. In the San Diego Community College District, where Cortez was chancellor from summer 2021 through spring 2023, faculty pay increased modestly, by an average of 2.5% in 2022 and 4.5% a year later, after a period of small increases before he arrived. Cortez quit that job after a year and a half. He was paid a total of $1.36 million during his short tenure, including $546,601 for his final four months, according to Transparent California, a database of California public employee salaries. While chancellor in San Diego, Cortez made news in 2022 when he was forced to cancel his belated welcoming ceremony at Petco Park after receiving complaints for inviting Alice Walker as keynote speaker. The Pulitzer-Prize winning author of 'The Color Purple' has for years been accused of antisemitism, including for penning a poem in which she called the Talmud, the book of Jewish law, 'poison,' and for her support of conspiracy-theorist David Icke. After 20 months on the job, Cortez announced in March 2023 that he was taking 'extended emergency leave' to care for his ill parents. On May 1, district officials announced that he had resigned to be with his parents in Florida. By that fall, however, he was a finalist for the chancellor's job in three Bay Area college districts: Peralta in the East Bay, Contra Costa and San Mateo. Court records show that on Jan. 19, 2024, police in Florida arrested Cortez on suspicion of driving under the influence. Ultimately, he pled no contest to the reduced charge of reckless driving. In a phone conversation, Cortez declined to answer a reporter's questions without authorization from City College. But he said the Florida charge was due to a 'mixture of prescription medicine.' While Bailey has not suggested layoffs, he has adopted an approach that acknowledges financial instability at the college of 44,000 full- and part-time students. Salaries eat up 90% of the general fund, compared with 82% statewide, and next year the college will lose millions of dollars in extra state funding that has kept it afloat since 2018 due to severe enrollment loss. Reserves are at 16% of general fund expenditures, far below the 33% average across other colleges. Among the ideas Bailey references in a May 8 budget update are reducing the number of single classes that attract few students and currently make up 70% of academic offerings. Instead, Bailey wants faculty to consider teaching more groups of classes that carry large numbers of students toward their degrees. It's an idea that does not sit well with the union, the American Federation of Teachers, Local 2121. 'In a dizzyingly shallow presentation, Interim Chancellor proposes cuts to 70% of College with no analysis,' the union headlined its essay accusing Bailey of targeting ethnic studies classes. The union essay called for 'serious leadership' that would tap into its $31 million reserves to pay for more academics, not less. Alexis Litzky, a communications professor and outgoing chair of the Academic Senate, called the union's description of Bailey's idea for boosting more popular classes a 'mischaracterization of the chancellor's presentation.' She said Bailey is not suggesting that the college axe classes but that faculty review course offerings so that City College can 'evaluate options for updating our programs and schedules.' The Academic Senate works with both the union and administrators. Litzky said the college has been confronting its accreditation missteps by working with a state assistance team, and that Bailey's budget workshops have been helpful in educating the college community about its finances. 'It actually feels like we're going in the right direction,' she said. Cortez, 50, earned his doctorate at the University of Southern California, focusing on 'African American Womanist political historical contributions to social welfare and education policy reform,' according to his employment bio. During his academic career as an instructor and administrator, Cortez served as dean of instruction at Berkeley City College and, before becoming chancellor in San Diego, was president of San Diego College of Continuing Education. The Chronicle reached out to trustees in each of the Bay Area college districts where Cortez applied since leaving San Diego, as well as to trustees of Madison College and Pasadena City College, where he was a finalist in April 2024 before he withdrew his name from consideration. Cortez told the Chronicle he had decided he didn't want to live in Madison. Only one trustee responded, agreeing to comment without being identified because the person was not authorized to speak about it publicly. 'He is very charismatic. He dazzled us,' said the board member from Pasadena. But the college did not select Cortez as its leader. The trustee declined to say why. San Diego trustees did not respond to requests for comment. Professor Inna Kanevsky, who teaches psychology at San Diego Mesa College and got into a public dispute with Cortez over the Alice Walker episode, said she was 'sad to hear' that he was the leading candidate at City College. Cortez drew ire from the free-speech group FIRE — the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression — when he blocked Kanevsky on social media after she complained that the Walker invitation would harm Jewish students. FIRE told the college district that the action violated Kanvesky's First Amendment rights. The chancellor then deleted his own account.
Time Magazine
08-05-2025
- General
- Time Magazine
Barbara Kingsolver
In the years leading up to the publication of her Pulitzer-Prize winning 2022 novel Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver spent time in Lee County, Va., the drug-ravaged southern Appalachian region where it's set (about an hour and a half from her home). She sat down with people in active addiction, as well as those in recovery, and listened to their stories. 'I gained so much compassion, and I wanted to do something,' she says. 'I thought, 'Lee County gave me a story—I'm going to give something back that really makes a difference.' I mean, how could I not?' After the book was published, Kingsolver traveled back to Lee County and convened a group of friends who live in the area for a breakfast meeting. If she had $100,000 to help people in addiction recovery, she asked them, where should it go? Everyone agreed that in this county with so few resources, the greatest need was for a sober home where people in recovery could live in safety and support: with counseling, transportation, and job training. 'When people leave their addiction behind, they almost always leave behind their whole word,' Kingsolver says. 'People come out of addiction with no social capital at all, no friends, no skills, no education, no transportation or even a driver's license. Addiction strips you of all those things.' Kingsolver found the 'perfect house,' doubled her investment, and used her royalties from Demon Copperhead to turn it into a recovery home for people battling addiction. The Higher Ground Women's Recovery Residence opened in 2025, and Kingsolver and her team are already working on expansion plans. Readers around the world have embraced the project along with the Lee County community. Fans in Switzerland raised money to order porch furniture for the house. The local community college offered free tuition for women residents to take classes, and nearby attorneys have donated their services. 'I think the happiest part of this is that it went from a wild dream or a wish in my head to an actual house—a beautiful house with a red door and a red roof and women inside who are getting their lives back,' she says. 'It's unstoppable at this point. I think it's going to grow and grow.'
Yahoo
01-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
What was food like before the FDA?
We have a tendency to romanticize the past. Think about the food your great grandparents (or even their parents) ate in childhood and you might imagine farm fresh produce, pure milled grains, and pristine meat and dairy. But if they were living in the United States during the mid-to-late 19th century, that vision of food utopia wasn't likely reality. Before 1906, there were no federal food safety regulations in the US. Local grocers were a wild west of unlabeled additives, untested chemicals, and inedible fillers. In the gap between the industrialization of the food system during the mid-1800's and those first laws dictating what could be sold as food, working class Americans spent decades eating 'mostly crap,' says Deborah Blum, a Pulitzer-Prize winning science journalist. In her 2019 book, The Poison Squad, Blum details the origin story of the landmark Food and Drug Act. As more folks left farm life behind and came to rely on manufactured food 'an enormous amount of food fraud' emerged, Blum tells Popular Science. Nowadays, the overwhelming majority of people continue to purchase their food from grocery aisles, but the food we buy there is much less liable to make us sick. So, how did we get from that past to our current present? And, with regulatory agencies including the FDA facing enormous cuts, what might the future hold? European countries, including Britain, Germany, and France passed food safety regulations about 50 years before the US did. In classic American style, we eschewed top-down restrictions and allowed the free market, free rein. In lieu of federal regulation, there was a haphazard patchwork of state and local laws surrounding certain foods pre-1906. Massachusetts, for instance, passed 'An Act Against Selling Unwholesome Provisions' in 1785. But unsafe practices consistently fell through the cracks and into consumers' stomachs, says Blum. In some cases, food wasn't food at all. Pre-pasteurization, milk spoilage and bacterial growth was a major problem. Away from the farm, dairy had to travel farther and keep for longer if people in cities were going to buy it. So, the dairy section became a hotbed of questionable additives. Borax, which you may recognize as a general-purpose pesticide, was used as a milk and butter preservative. Formaldehyde (AKA embalming fluid) was also a common milk additive and antibacterial agent. In addition to preserving the milk, formaldehyde also reportedly had a slightly sweet flavor, which helped improve the taste of rot, Blum explains. In cheese, lead compounds were added to boost its golden color. Plaster of Paris, gypsum, and other white, powdery fillers made their way into milk and flour for color and texture. Flour was often portioned out by the grocer in-store–with mixed results. 'If you went to a very honest grocer, you might get real flour. If you didn't you might get a mix,' she says. Coffee and spices were particularly terrible offenders. Ground coffee was often about 80 to 90 percent adulterated in the mid-19th century, says Blum. It might be made up of ground bone, blackened with lead, or charred seeds and plant matter. Spices were frequently 100 percent adulterated. Or, in other words, entirely made up of something other than what they were sold as. Cinnamon was frequently brick dust. Ground pepper could have been ground shells or charred rope. 'Probably a good half of these products had some adulteration, depending on what you were looking at and how much you were willing to pay,' she says. The wealthy were generally able to afford higher quality, authentic, uncontaminated products. But for everyone else, the problem of food fraud was so prevalent that people developed a suspicion of ground coffee, Blum says. Consumers started opting for whole beans instead, wherever possible. Suddenly, there was a market for counterfeit whole coffee beans, made of pigeon beans and peas, or even wax and clay. 'You can find flyers that went to grocers that said, 'you can, multiply your profits with our super cheap dirt beans.'' In her research, Blum found a record of a congressional hearing, where a food manufacturer described producing and selling a 'strawberry jam' that was entirely red dye, corn syrup, and grass seed. His defense for the practice: 'we have to be competitive in the market and other people are doing it too,' paraphrases Blum. As all of the above was going on, people had little idea what they were consuming. 'There was no labeling,' she notes. Though there were many cases of people falling ill. In an Indiana orphanage, multiple children died from formaldehyde poisoning. In New York state, an estimated 8,000 infants died from adulterated 'swill milk' in a single year. [ Related: FDA bans Red No. 3 dye found in many of your favorite snacks. ] Calls for change came from multiple fronts, including womens' groups and the growing 'pure food' movement of the late 1800s, says Blum. But one chemist and physician, Harvey Washington Wiley, proved particularly dedicated and ultimately influential. Wiley began noting and publishing reports on food contaminants during his work at the USDA in the 1880s and '90s. His primary job was to develop alternatives to sugar cane, but he started studying and cataloging adulteration in butter, milk, and honey– and later spices and alcoholic beverages. That's where much of our data on food adulteration at the time comes from, notes Blum. Soon, Wiley was releasing regular bulletins on food adulterants and advocating for national of his early attempts ended in failure. Congressional representatives received a lot of money from the food industry, and weren't receptive to Wiley's science-backed pleas for labels, transparency, and contamination regulations, says Blum. 'He keeps pushing for it. The industry keeps shooting it down, and the political dog fight continues,' she says. But then, Wiley shifted tactics. He began conducting a series of experiments that he called the 'hygienic table trials' with a group of USDA employees, later dubbed 'the poison squad.' All of the dozen or so participants willingly and knowingly signed up to receive three freshly prepared meals, seven days a week, for six months from the newly created USDA test kitchen. Yet, along with their nourishing meals, a subset of the participants were also fed additives commonly found in adulterated food. 'You could never have gotten this sort of study approved today,' says Blum. 'He poisoned his co-workers.' The group worked their way through borax, boric acid, salicylic acid, benzoic acid, sulfur dioxide, formaldehyde, copper sulfate, and saltpeter– among other things. Unsurprisingly, the squad was frequently sick and the experiment garnered a ton of publicity. 'If you go to newspapers of the time, every single one had a story–'Americans are eating poison,'' Blum says. The fervor, paired with the public outcry in response to Upton Sinclair's book The Jungle, about Chicago's meatpacking plants, led politicians to change their tune. In 1906, Congress passed both the Meat Inspection Act and the Food and Drug Act (colloquially known as 'Wiley's Law'). Later, the Food and Drug Act would be replaced by the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics act of 1938, which has been extensively revised and updated since. From these laws, the modern USDA– responsible for regulating meat and poultry products– and FDA, responsible for all other foods and pharmaceuticals, emerged. Since the start of federal food regulation, states have beefed up their policies and the food industry has adopted its own standards. Many companies have even signed on to efforts like the Global Food Safety Initiative, which involves third-party testing beyond what's legally required. Plus, the mere existence of federal law means that people can sue when things go wrong. Litigation is a big driver of compliance and caution at the corporate level, says Blum. Yet the FDA still plays a key role in oversight, research, and responding to emerging threats like bird flu in milk, says Brian Schaneberg, a chemist and director of the Institute for Food Safety and Health (IFSH) at Illinois IFSH, academic researchers collaborate directly with industry and FDA scientists and the institute hosts multiple federal projects and labs. Research there includes work on improving infant formula safety, food contamination from packaging, pathogen prevention in food manufacturing and produce, investigating the causes of illness outbreaks, and Grade A milk validation. 'We really touch a lot of areas,' Schaneberg tells Popular Science. Recently, the Trump Administration slashed more than 3,500 FDA jobs, amid broader slap-dash federal cuts. Despite claims to the contrary, these layoffs included dozens of scientists who conduct quality control and proficiency testing on everything from infant formula to dairy products and pet foods. The cuts have temporarily left the Center for Processing Innovation at IFSH almost entirely unstaffed, Schaneberg notes. From 15 staff, they're down to four. Other labs across the country were also impacted. After public pushback, FDA leadership promised to reinstate scientists in key roles and re-open a handful of the shuttered labs last week. At Schaneberg's institute, federal scientists have been told they'll be reinstated. Though, he notes they haven't received formal notices confirming their re-hiring. The long-term fate of FDA research and testing labs also remains uncertain as proposed major budget cuts and a massive reorganization looms. The currently proposed Trump Administration plan would shift most food testing to the states. [ Related: How to properly wash fruits and vegetables. ] 'I'm definitely concerned,' says Schaneberg. He doesn't see any clear, immediate threat to consumers, but in the long-term– he is worried about the FDA's ability to ensure food safety if the agency is equipped with fewer staff and resources. 'I still think all the big companies are going to do the best thing they can because they don't want to hurt their brands and they don't want to impact people.' And many states might have the ability to fill gaps. Yet there's always bad actors, new brands, new additives, and unknowns, he notes. It may be much rarer than it once was, but the FDA still detects unsettling instances of food contamination. In 2023 and 2024, the agency investigated high lead and chromium levels in cinnamon applesauce pouches, marketed to children, notes Martin Bucknavage, a senior food safety extension specialist in the Department of Food Science at Penn State University. 'There's those types of things that pop up, and it's like 'who– who else is going to go through and do that?,'' he says. The FDA has expertise in the science and the supply chains that few other institutions do, Bucknavage says, along with the ability and authority to respond quickly. With rapid changes and reorganization on the horizon, it's hard to predict what the effect will be, he adds. 'I think immediate-term, our food supply is going to be safe,' Bucknavage says. After all, FDA inspections are far less frequent than companies' own safety tests and measures. But without the final layer of oversight, it's possible something could be lost down the line, he says. Blum, with all her knowledge of the treacherous food landscape of decades past, agrees. 'I'm not sitting here saying catastrophe, because we don't actually know,' she says. 'But there's nothing in what the [Trump Administration] is doing that you would look at and say, 'oh this makes us safer.''
Telegraph
27-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Jurgen Klopp meeting that set Liverpool on path to title glory
In a Formby mansion on Victoria Road, 13 miles from Anfield, two chief architects of Liverpool's re-emergence as a superpower are mapping out the course towards the club's 20th league title. For Jürgen Klopp and Michael Edwards it is a moment of hope and high risk. The exiting managerial legend and the newly appointed Fenway Sports Group football chief executive have reunited for a daunting challenge: how to ensure Klopp's last dance avoids the missteps at Manchester United after Sir Alex Ferguson quit in 2013, and Arsenal in the immediate aftermath of Arsène Wenger's exit. Those close to the duo consider this Liverpool Football Club's equivalent of John Lennon and Paul McCartney tuning up for a final rooftop performance. Recognising the magnitude of the task, Klopp welcomed Edwards into his home in March 2024 to mull over the past, consider the immediate possibilities of the present, and commit his final few weeks in charge to facilitate a golden future. Edwards already had an idea who Klopp's successor would be, although the deal was yet to be done. 'Arne Slot? Cool decision,' said Klopp when he was told who Liverpool wanted the next manager to be. So began the smoothest Kop transition since Bill Shankly handed the reins to his assistant Bob Paisley in the summer of 1974. Within Anfield, it has been colourfully christened 'the immaculate handover'. As he takes his place in the pantheon with legendary title winners, Slot should be lauded as the author of this title season. He will acknowledge the Pulitzer-Prize standard of the prologue written by others. It consisted of more than Klopp conducting the Kop to sing Slot's name on the final day of last season, the outgoing manager serving briefly as the next incumbent's chief scout as much as cheerleader. 🗣️ 'ARNE SLOT! LA LA, LA LA LA!' 🔴 It was Jurgen Klopp's moment. He used it to give Liverpool fans a new song for their incoming manager. One of the biggest clips on the Optus Sport social media pages in 2024, and there's no wonder why! — Optus Sport (@OptusSport) December 26, 2024 And it absorbs a restructure of football operations which means Liverpool no longer impose so much responsibility into a single, charismatic leader. Slot, whose title 'head coach' was a deliberate specification, gratefully embraced Klopp's input. The pair had many long phone conversations as their reigns overlapped – Klopp's assistant Pep Lijnders was similarly proactive in sharing information – Slot intent on blending the recipes of his predecessor with his own speculaaskruiden. 'Similar, but different' became the recurring theme of his triumphant debut campaign. Once Klopp and Edwards ended their chat on that spring day, the manager still believed he could win 'No 20'. His side ran out of gas in the final weeks of the title race, but he was reassured he was leaving at the right time to the perfect coach. 'I can't wait to see you make the next steps,' he told the team in his final address. Klopp's journey to this serenity was long, winding and exhausting. A triumph five years in the making Rewind 14 months and Klopp cut a more downbeat figure, and to understand fully how Liverpool became champions again in 2025 demands appreciation of how the club withstood an energy crisis and loss of central figures following their previous title. The triumph of 2020 was a story of reconstruction; the 2025 success is one of reinvigoration. When the 30-year wait to be English champions ended, it seemed a new Anfield dynasty beckoned under Klopp. Instead, the immediate aftermath in the grip of Covid was debilitating, and attempts to delegitimise the success by rivals who had wanted the season to be null and void were dispiriting. Any chance of successive championships was wrecked by a serious knee injury to Virgil van Dijk in October 2020. Liverpool's title defence was a slog. A crippling injury list did not prevent brutal criticism as Liverpool were forced to play central midfielders or rookies at centre-back in a soulless, deserted Anfield. By the end of the gruelling 2020-21 campaign, Klopp ranked finishing third as 'one of the biggest achievements ever'. 'I know how that sounds, but it's the truth,' he said. 'If you want to write a book about a season and you want to be depressed afterwards, then you'd probably take this season.' Klopp insisted he was not fatigued – he would later surprise many within the club by signing a four-year deal and quoting the Beatles – 'I feel fine'. Others were more inclined to shout 'help!' The responsibility of guaranteeing Liverpool challenge every year in an increasingly competitive environment took a toll. Liverpool would have had four titles since 2014 but for three last-day heartbreaks against a club under investigation for breaching spending limits. They would have three Champions League title wins since 2018 but for two final losses against the most decorated club in Europe, Real Madrid. Taking on these behemoths with what is described internally as a 'moral and responsible' transfer policy limits the scope for expensive mistakes. Edwards and his chief lieutenants, Julian Ward and influential head of data Ian Graham, had been at Liverpool since 2011. Fenway Sports Group president Michael Gordon – who could be seen as the Brian Epstein of the operation and was dubbed the 'man who never sleeps' by Edwards – understood the foundations were about to be put to their stiffest test. They would need reinforcing. 'There were many people at the club who had dedicated their life to Liverpool for 10 years and they were starting to feel the impact of individual burnout,' reflected one senior Anfield source. After the title defence, Edwards and Graham decided the next season was their last. They almost left on the ultimate high, Liverpool two wins from a historic quadruple in May 2022 as they showed fitness, not a lack of foresight, quality or signings, had been the main problem 12 months earlier. Ward, Edwards's deputy, assumed the sporting director's role. Within months he admitted that he also needed a break. So long as Klopp was front of house, it seemed business as usual. The manager believed the team would go again in 2022-23. Instead, the next six months would be his most exhausting as he and others began to experience the same symptoms that had prompted Edwards to quit. At the top of FSG, Gordon confided to Klopp that he too needed to step back from day-to-day duties for personal reasons. At the time, Liverpool downplayed the importance of so much reconfiguration. Today, there are admissions that, pieced together, it amounted to seismic activity. The next tremor was in November 2022, when FSG tested the market by dispatching what was described pithily as a 'sale, but not for sale' document, ambiguous enough to invite potential buyers to bid for the club, while allowing the owners to reiterate with great force that they were looking for investment rather than a strategic exit. The process added to the broader precariousness as the team's form unravelled. By the mid-season break for the Qatar World Cup in December 2022, Klopp looked like he was standing solo at Liverpool's winter training camp in Dubai, too much responsibility in one figurehead to find the answers. The three pillars critical to Liverpool's success circa 2015-20 were Gordon, Klopp and Edwards. One was gone and the other two were contemplating their roles in the club's future. The engine room that drove Klopp's greatest triumphs – captain Jordan Henderson, Fabinho and James Milner (Georginio Wijnaldum left 18 months earlier) – were on the final bar of their battery life. The previous summer's signings, Darwin Núñez and Fabio Carvalho, were not a good fit. Liverpool, in their worst position since Klopp's appointment, would fail to retain Champions League status. The Kop's love for the manager remained unconditional, but for the first time his judgment was being questioned by supporters who felt he had erred in ignoring the need for a midfield revamp sooner. This was the epicentre in the journey between the two Premier League wins – the moment when Klopp knew the clock was ticking on his reign. Klopp's finest and most selfless act Some close to Klopp believe that had previous levels been maintained in 2022-23, he would have gone sooner. Instead, he pledged he would not leave a mess. This, many at the club passionately argue, was one of his finest and most selfless managerial acts. 'You will never see a greater example of a world-class manager putting ego aside to make sure everything was in place for his successor,' said a source close to the owners. 'Jürgen had a profound effect on Liverpool's history when he joined, and the gracious manner of his departure meant he did exactly the same when he left.' Klopp's vision, as with his first triumph, was to put incremental building blocks back into the team. 'To accomplish big things, do a lot of little things right and add them up,' he would always tell colleagues. Trust the process. Lay the foundations brick by brick. These are now Liverpool slogans as much as 'pass and move' in the boot-room years. The flames of revival in the side Klopp would christen 'Liverpool 2.0' ignited with the first key purchase of that time, PSV Eindhoven's Cody Gakpo, in January 2023. Work then accelerated on a midfield refit, the business of summer 2023 crucial. Liverpool's recruitment team had earlier produced a report naming three of the best young central midfielders in Europe; Monaco's Aurélien Tchouaméni, Borussia Dortmund's Jude Bellingham and Ajax's Ryan Gravenberch. In 2022, Tchouaméni rejected Liverpool and joined Real Madrid for €100 million (£85 million), while Gravenberch chose Bayern Munich. Borussia Dortmund would not sell Bellingham in the same summer they lost Erling Haaland. Liverpool hoped they could tempt Bellingham in the summer of 2023. Once Real Madrid made their move for the England man, reality dawned he too would be going to the Bernabéu. News of Liverpool conceding defeat was confirmed in March 2023. It played badly with the fans, prompting one of Klopp's most tempestuous media appearances when frustrations boiled over about the lack of understanding about what the club had achieved in going head-to-head with Manchester City. 'I never understood why we constantly speak about things we theoretically cannot have,' Klopp said. 'We are not children asking for a Ferrari at Christmas. There are moments when you step aside and do different stuff.' Three midfielders for the price of one Bellingham The 'different stuff' consisted of three midfielders instead of one; Alexis Mac Allister, Dominik Szoboszlai and Gravenberch, who became the next archetypal FSG signing – a meticulously scouted young footballer struggling after his first high-profile move but who might only need a change of scene to unlock his talent to become an Anfield bargain. Thus, in true 'moneyball' style, Liverpool created Bellingham 'in the aggregate' with players whose combined fee of £130 million is marginally higher than the sum Dortmund received for the England midfielder, and whose salaries added together were less than it would have cost for one superstar. Ward, working until the last day of his contract, was crucial as he oversaw all those deals. Once he had left, transfer policy briefly seemed more erratic. Liverpool bid £111 million for Moisés Caicedo – a punt in which it was calculated that the best-case scenario was the Brighton midfielder would snub Stamford Bridge and dash to Anfield, and in the worst case prompt Chelsea to pay £115 million for a player they had originally valued at £70 million. Whatever the intent, it was not a good look for the Anfield club, especially as they also lost out to Chelsea for Southampton's Romeo Lavía. Klopp and Jörg Schmadtke, a short-term appointment as sporting director, used their Bundesliga contacts to sign Wataru Endo, a quirky but popular choice. Within weeks of the 2023-24 season, the new Liverpool fused, the trusted seniors Mohamed Salah, Van Dijk and Alisson Becker reasserting their class alongside recent recruits and emerging academy talents as Liverpool went on to win the Carabao Cup and challenge for the league title. Klopp to leave, but Edwards to return Klopp looked refreshed. In reality, he was demob happy. In November, the German confirmed to the owners the rebuild was a gift for his replacement. 'The players will benefit from a new voice,' Klopp informed his board. When the formal announcement was met with shock, there was calm in Boston, appreciative of the head start in the recruitment process. Principal owner John W Henry and chairman Tom Werner trusted the processes and people they had put in place at Anfield would ensure a smooth transition, although at that stage there was no stand-out replacement. Like everyone else on the day he quit, Klopp presumed former Liverpool midfielder Xabi Alonso was the obvious choice, and there are suggestions one of the reasons he announced his intentions so early was to allow Liverpool to move swiftly. Gordon decided he would not try to replace the irreplaceable, considering it a fool's errand. What Liverpool needed was a restructured football project consisting of the smartest operators so that the next incumbent never felt he had to carry the backpack alone. Sitting in his office with a blank sheet of paper, Gordon wrote the only name he considered capable of assembling it. 'Michael Edwards? A f---ing great idea,' Klopp responded. Gordon had never stopped trying to lure back Edwards because he considers him the best football executive in world football. There was no plan B. Gordon was buoyed by the fact Edwards had not joined a rival club, nor been tempted to join one of the federations or investment groups seducing him. After meeting Chelsea's new owners and Sir Jim Ratcliffe's Ineos, and rejecting a formal offer from the Glazer family to rebuild Manchester United's football department, a refreshed, enthused Edwards concluded that the sensible option was a return to the FSG fold, this time to effectively take Gordon's job and assume a broader portfolio. A few days later he was in Klopp's home – legacy planning. Edwards appointed Bournemouth's Richard Hughes as the new sporting director, and such was the trust, Liverpool's owners deferred responsibility to find the right manager. They were informed by Edwards and Hughes that Alonso was committed to another year at Bayer Leverkusen. Another target, Sporting Lisbon's Ruben Amorim, was admired but did not play the right formation for Liverpool's squad profile. The modelling always placed the Feyenoord coach top (Edwards first mentioned his name to Gordon before agreeing to return to Liverpool), and when Hughes and Slot gelled from their first meeting in the Netherlands, the appointment was green-lit in Boston. Slot ready to defy expectations Slot did not meet any of the owners until the pre-season tour of the United States, the knowledge and vision he shared over a glass of wine in a Pittsburgh Hotel impressing upon FSG they had made what one called 'a phenomenal appointment'. The Dutchman's direct talks with Klopp convinced him he was inheriting a team ready to defy pre-season predictions they could not compete for the title. Edwards and Hughes were also sure. Despite the usual clamour for expensive signings, they withstood pressure to spend to appease the usual emotional reaction. When Real Sociedad midfielder Martín Zubimendi turned down Liverpool , they opted to wait rather than pursue less-talented players. 'The art of leadership is saying no, not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes,' is another of Edwards's mantras, stealing a line from former Labour prime minister Tony Blair. Thus, Slot's line-up relied on familiarity and freshness for a winning formula. A new coffee bar at the AXA Training Centre? ☕️ Arne Slot reveals the secrets behind his super start at Liverpool 👀 — Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) February 16, 2025 Klopp was the ultimate motivator who weaponised emotion. Slot is an educator inclined towards deduction, his 'evidence-based' approach to decision-making echoing that of Gordon and the recruitment team. Where his predecessor used meetings to stir the blood, making players leave his office feeling 10 feet tall, Slot would make them feel like they are taking a football master's degree, his use of videos producing 'show-and-tell' classes. More periodisation was introduced in training, Slot more inclined to reduce intensity before match days than increase it. His clever substitutions, bending the shape of games, immediately caught the eye. Fun Reaction Drill with 3 Players | Liverpool FC Training by Arne Slot 🧠⚡ Follow @11OnceSport #ReactionDrill #LiverpoolFC #ArneSlot #FootballTraining #SoccerDrills #SpeedAndAgility #dariograbusic #oncesportanalyser #nogomet #trening #football #soccer #coach #training — Dario Grabusic (@dariograbusic) April 4, 2025 Nobody expected the drop-off at City and Arsenal to allow Liverpool to gallop ahead, but the evidence backed up the expectation that Slot's team were better than rivals believed. They had already gone toe-to-toe with City and Arsenal in 2023-24 before injuries stopped momentum. Over the preceding eight years under Klopp, Liverpool's points-per-game average eclipsed the numbers accumulated in the golden era from the mid-1970s to the late 1980s, and the research into Slot showed he had a track record for improving players' levels. Slot's reinvention of Gravenberch as his No 6 was an emblematic tweak, complementing the enduring brilliance of Salah, Van Dijk and Trent Alexander-Arnold in a 26-game unbeaten league stretch. The contract wrangles around the three superstars had zero impact. For Edwards and the owners, Slot winning the title at his first attempt is validation of the ' intellectualisation' of Liverpool led by Gordon since 2012, in which some club staff have jumped from being a nuclear scientist with a PhD in physics from Harvard University to analysing the effectiveness of Feyenoord's counter-press circa 2021-24. 'Mike [Gordon] appointed the best in class in every department so that people could come and go and the club would still thrive,' said a source. Edwards is preserving and enhancing that process in an executive transition as spectacular as Klopp's handover to Slot, although one of his favourite maxims reflects a variation of a quote from an American political strategist, James Carville, who said elections are always decided by the state of the economy. 'It's the players, stupid,' is Edwards' application of the rule. No matter how good the various departments; analytics, scouting, sports science, nutritionists and coaching, without the on-field talent, nobody looks good. Surround great players with those exceptional at their job, and you are building to win. There is no arrogance within after such an achievement. The troubles post-2020 are a reminder of how quickly the sands can shift. But such is the self-belief one of the owners has been privately investing anonymously since before the last Premier League win under the pseudonym 'title19'. It is with pleasure he acknowledges that it is now out of date and work for 'title21' has already begun. Liverpool's foundations have never looked so stable. A year ago, Slot declined the chance to move into Klopp's old house on what could aptly be translated as Victory Road. He has proved to be perfectly at home celebrating on his predecessor's Anfield turf instead. The six key games in Liverpool's title charge Ipswich Town 0 Liverpool 2, August 17, 2024 Liverpool's first game of the post-Jürgen Klopp era set the tone for the season. All eyes were on Arne Slot and, after a lacklustre first half, an authoritative substitution (taking off young centre-back Jarell Quansah) and tactical tweak facilitated a comfortable second-half win. Manchester United 0 Liverpool 3, September 1, 2024 A statement performance in the stadium where Klopp's Premier League and title ambitions unravelled six months earlier. At full time, Mohamed Salah celebrated his goal and man-of-the-match display with the first of many pleas for a new contract – the ultimate vote of confidence in the new regime. Liverpool 0 Nottingham Forest 1, September 14, 2024 Not so much the loss as the reaction to it. Slot's first setback was immediately after the international break and caused a twinge of doubt. However, his side would remain unbeaten for 26 games, and Forest were more formidable than previously realised. Tottenham Hotspur 3 Liverpool 6, December 22, 2024 The context made this significant. After Manchester City lost to Aston Villa a day earlier, Liverpool had an opportunity to put 12 points between themselves and the champions, having played a game fewer. An emphatic win in London ended Pep Guardiola's title hopes and established Slot's side as favourites. Brentford 0 Liverpool 2, January 18, 2025 A Liverpool wobble was anticipated as this fixture began a sequence of demanding away games. The prospect of the gap to Arsenal being reduced to two points was real. But Darwin Núñez scored twice in injury time, extending the lead to six after Arsenal failed to beat Villa. Manchester City 0 Liverpool 2, February 23, 2025 A day after Arsenal lost at home against West Ham United, Liverpool comfortably defeated the champions at the Etihad Stadium as Slot's side emerged from their most demanding run with an 11-point lead. After the controlled performance, neutrals considered it a matter of when, not if, Liverpool would be champions.
Yahoo
19-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump Drops Classified JFK Files–but What's Inside?
The Trump administration dropped thousands of classified documents on late President John F. Kennedy's assassination Tuesday as part of their larger quest for transparency. On Monday, President Donald Trump announced that most of the 80,000 pages remaining on Kennedy's murder would be released in full—without any redactions—and quipped that the public has 'a lot of reading' to do. On Tuesday evening, 1,123 PDF files were uploaded to the National Archives which noted 'as the records continue to be digitized, they will be posted to this page.' The outcome of the documents in full is yet to be determined, however according to The New York Times, most documents were shorter than 10 pages and mainly consisted of handwritten notes or typewritten reports. Most are difficult to read with age, The Times notes, with the burdensome process behind their digitization further complicating their illegibility. David Garrow, a Pulitzer-Prize winning author and historian who has considerably worked on American intelligence agencies, told The Times that Tuesday's dump is 'profoundly more impenetrable than all the previous more annotated ones.' He explained that many of the files lacked a file number or which agency they originated from. One file he said discussed 'random Cuban stuff from 1965.' Another historian, Tim Naftali, similarly told the outlet that his long expedition into the JFK trove has so far yielded no relic of importance. 'I am trying to find stuff that has been re-reviewed and re-released with new information,' Naftali shared. 'Some have and some have not.' This was expected however, by both historians and officials within the Trump administration who reportedly told the New York Post that they didn't expect anything revelatory to be released. While some new details may be included, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics and author of The Kennedy Half-Century Larry J. Sabato told the Associated Press that it will take some time for experts to sift through the documents to discern if there is anything of significance. 'We have a lot of work to do for a long time to come, and people just have to accept that,' Sabato reiterated. The National Archives states that around 99 percent of the estimated 320,000 known Kennedy documents have been publicly released since Congress passed a 1992 law requiring their disclosure. Some documents however remain under court-ordered seals, and the FBI claimed to have even found an additional 2,400 records linked to Kennedy's assassination last month. The former president was killed on Nov. 22, 1963 during a visit to Dallas where he was shot in his open-car motorcade. His assassination has long been the subject of national fascination, inspiring a slew of conspiracies and enriching an environment of distrust toward the government. In 1964, the Warren Commission found that Kennedy was killed by 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald who they said acted alone. Oswald however, died two days after being arrested in 1963 when nightclub owner Jack Ruby shot him during a jail transfer. Conspirators have long held the belief that Kennedy's death was orchestrated on a scale beyond Oswald, with the CIA, the Mafia, the KGB, Fidel Castro, and even Kennedy's Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson being floated as masterminds behind the assassination. While the declassified documents may not yet prove anything new, they certainly seem to have struck a chord with Kennedy's grandson Jack Schlossberg who wrote on X Tuesday night: 'No—THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION DID NOT GIVE ANYONE IN PRESIDENT KENNEDY'S FAMILY 'A HEADS UP' ABOUT THE RELEASE. 'A total surprise, and not shocker !! But @RobertKennedyJr definitely knew,' he added. The Kennedy heir also dismissed CNN for covering the files' release, proclaiming in a video posted to X: 'There's so much actual news going on, why are you covering this?'
