Three Fun Things

Two books, one video, and the ultimate recipe for dressing—not stuffing.

Borrowing liberally from the New Yorker’s “Take Three” column featuring writers’ current obsessions (and Josh Feit’s regular Les Obsessions posts) here are three things I’m enjoying this week that have nothing to do with local politics.

1. Literary synchronicity.

You know that feeling when you realize that two things you’re reading, watching, or listening to are actually related in some way—either directly (in terms of subject matter) or indirectly (because they’re in conversation with each other in some other way, like a corrective book on Luddism and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein?

That happened to me this week with two books: One that had been sitting on my shelf called The Limousine Liberal (Steve Frazier, 2016) and a new one from the library called Jewish Space Lasers (Max Rothschild, 2023). I’m about a third of the way into each book, and neither is blowing me away so far—the former feels a bit padded and repetitious, and the latter is surprisingly breezy for a history that stretches back into the 18th century, usually a tough sell for me. That said, both cover the history of a subject that is as timely now as it has ever been: Antisemitic conspiracy theories. These theories, which have spread widely thanks to the accelerant of unmoderated social media, vary in detail, but they all center on a supposed cabal of liberal Jewish elites who secretly run the world through their control of governments, banks, and the movement of people and money around the globe.

“Jewish Space Lasers,” of course, is a reference to US Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s unhinged theory that the Rothschilds control lasers in space that caused wildfires in California. And “limousine liberals” is a concept whose roots in the US goes back at least to the early 1900s, when Henry Ford inveighed against “international Jews” who, according to opinion pieces he published in his newspaper in the 1920s, caused everything from the world war to the collapse of family farms to violent crime. (And also, jazz.)

The Limousine Liberal: How an Incendiary Image United the Right and Fractured America

Jewish Space Lasers: The Rothschilds and 200 Years of Conspiracy Theories

2. A brief education on car “rebadging”

When I was in my 20s, I bought the worst car I ever had, and possibly the worst car any company has ever made: A 1987 Plymouth Sundance. My dad, a car guy who worked at Goodyear for many years, advised against it, but buying an American car against expert advice felt like some kind of rebellion. The year I bought it, I started dating a guy who worked with me at the Barnes and Noble, and lo and behold, he had the same car—only his was a Dodge Shadow. I figured the same company (Chrysler) just slapped different labels on the same cheap cars to save money (?) somehow (???) but never thought much more about it until this week, when Mustang Bobby linked this fascinating video, which describes how and why carmakers repurpose vehicles, from using the same chassis for different models all the way to literally just slapping a “Dodge” decal on a Hyundai without even taking off the Hyundai logo. Some cars have dozens of different names around the world; others (like the Aston Martin Cygnet, neé the Toyota IQ) are repurposed exclusively to reduce the overall carbon footprint of gas-guzzling luxury models. It’s an incredible 18-minute ride through a little-known slice of automotive history.

3. My mom’s dressing recipe.

Sandeep may have been skeptical on KUOW’s Seattle Now this week, but my family’s recipe for dressing (never stuffing) is a guaranteed hit. This is basically the cornbread dressing recipe from the Jackson, MS Junior League’s Southern Sideboards cookbook, but with a twist: Instead of stale white bread, we use packaged onion rolls, lightly toasted and torn into 1-to-2-inch pieces.

5 cups crumbled corn bread (your favorite recipe, although to make this traditional it should include minimal or no sugar)

4-5 cups toasted onion rolls, torn into 1” to 2”pieces

1 1/2 cups chicken or turkey stock

1 1/2 cups chopped onion

1 1/2 cups chopped celery

1 green bell pepper, chopped

12 tbsp. butter, divided and 6 tbsp melted

1/2 cup chopped parsley

2 tbsp. chopped sage

1 tsp. chopped thyme leaves

Salt and pepper to taste

2 eggs, beaten

Preheat oven to 400º. Soak corn bread and bread pieces in chicken stock. Cook vegetables in 4 tbsp (1/4 cup) butter until tender. Mix together the breads, cooked vegetables, and all other ingredients with a large wooden spoon or your hands, adding more stock if needed. Put mixture in buttered casserole dish and bake for about an hour or until done.