Sleve McDichael

BREAKING: California voters just passed Prop 37. Buyers of newly built homes can now put down 3% instead of 20%. How: the state lends you the other 17% as a second mortgage, funded by up to $25 billion in bonds. On an $800,000 home that's $24,000 down instead of $160,000.

I had an experience last night that I think perfectly sums up our political moment… I play basketball a couple times a week with a group of about 30 guys. I try really hard not to talk politics there…ball is life and my true escape…but one way or another it always comes up for a few minutes. Last night though, to no surprise, everyone was talking about the election results. Pretty much all the guys I play with are conservatives or Republicans, or just people who love America and end up voting Republican. Basically just normal people. There’s one liberal in the group. He was saying he hates how extreme both parties have become, but that Republicans are even worse, and we need more moderate, centrist options. As we were warming up, I asked him: “Okay, what’s Donald Trump’s most extreme position?” He paused and started talking about Trump’s attitude and tweets. I said, “No, what’s his most extreme *policy*?” He said, “I’d have to get back to you,” and started walking away. I kept poking at him a bit while we played. (Nothing like hardcore political trash talk, right?) And he didn’t have much to say. We set it aside and the friendship will live to see another day. But the point is this: Trump, despite what they say, is actually a moderate. He’s a former Democrat, old-school liberal who governs sensibly, thus conservatively. He would have (and still would) negotiate with Democrats on almost anything. But all the Democrats want to do is destroy (and eventually jail) him. If you think closing the border is extreme, fine. If you don’t like how ICE operates, say that. But picking up people who are here illegally isn’t extreme. You can dislike the methods without calling the basic idea far-right or racist. I’ve seen this over and over: you ask people what Trump has actually done that’s extreme, far-right, or racist, and they usually can’t answer. They just scurry away. The bigger issue now , especially after the results of midterms, is what comes *after* Trump on the right. A lot of people will say, “We tried it with the New York real estate guy who wanted to be liked and was willing to make a deal. It didn’t work. So now we go harder.” Then we could end up with an actual extremist, and even the TDS inflicted liberals will be looking back on the Trump years as the good old days. So if you know a confused liberal, this might be a good time to ask them to look in the mirror before it’s too late. Pro Tip: They probably won’t listen to you, but then just hit a couple threes in their face and it’ll still be time well spent.

For fifty eight years, my boss in Tokyo believed that beef should be sliced as thin as paper. In Japan, we cook thin meat for four seconds in boiling broth. That is our way. Then last month, the YouTube algorithm showed Director Sato a video of a man in Texas smoking a brisket. It changed his life. On Monday morning, he called me to his desk. His eyes were bloodshot. "Have you seen this?" he whispered, turning his monitor toward me. "The American pitmaster does not sleep for sixteen hours. He sits by the fire in the dark. He guards the meat like a castle." I said, "Sir, it is just a barbecue." He slammed his hand on the desk. "This is not cooking," he said. "This is a vigil." Last Saturday was our annual company picnic by the river in Kanagawa. Normally, we grill thin meat and yakisoba for two hours and go home at 2:00 PM. I arrived at 9:30 AM to help set up. Director Sato was already there. I want to be accurate here: he had been sitting in a folding chair since 10:00 PM on Friday night. He was wearing a towel around his head and staring at a massive black barrel smoker he had imported from Oklahoma. Inside I said: THIS MAN HAS ABANDONED CORPORATE LIFE FOR THE SMOKE. When we tried to help him, he held up a pair of metal tongs and clicked them twice. "Step back," he said calmly. "The stall has begun. Nobody opens the lid." Twelve Japanese accountants stood in complete silence around a barrel for four more hours. Nobody dared to eat a single noodle until he gave the signal. At 1:45 PM, he sliced the meat. It fell apart on the cutting board. My boss looked at the pink smoke ring, nodded once, and wiped a single tear from his cheek. He has already submitted an official budget request for a trailer smoker for next fiscal year.