The Far Middle episode 116 is dedicated to the great Jesse Owens. This episode’s August 9 release coincides with the 87th anniversary of Owens winning his fourth gold medal at the 1936 Summer Olympics. Nick reflects on Owens’ historic Olympics performance, including the stark difference in the way Owens was treated in Europe compared to his arrival home.

Following the “much-too-late dedication” to Owens, Nick examines a frequent Far Middle topic: the trouble facing many of America’s large cities. “The combination of the policies of the Left, being soft on crime, rampant and open drug use, remote work, broken public transit—those things are cumulatively and slowly squeezing new life out of America’s big city centers,” says Nick. He then highlights data points including cell phone activity and office occupancy rates that reaffirm the perilous state of America’s cities.

“All this big city financial pain and lack of vitality, it’s cascading into states,” says Nick, highlighting the budget woes of New York and California. “Tax revenues in states run by the Left, they’re plummeting big time.”

In assessing the cause of municipal, state, and national economic pain, Nick attributes rising interest rates as a key driver. And after a primer on the Federal Reserve and its inflation target, coupled with examples of the Left’s policies that are stoking the inflationary fire, Nick argues the Fed is nowhere near finished increasing interest rates.

“If you think that climate policies are not the root cause of inflation, and that inflation is well on its way to being tamed, consider our next connection regarding food prices,” says Nick. He calls out the increased price in items like pretzels, chips, cereal, and other prepackaged foods, which require substantial energy in their production, packaging, and ultimate delivery to grocery store shelves.

Nick pivots to Europe and the ECB, which is starting to finally look at reality as the ECB raised interest rates again at the end of July and is predicting inflation “to remain too high for too long.” But unfortunately, “the ECB won’t admit that the root of persistent and stubbornly high inflation in the EU emanates from climate policies,” says Nick.

Moving on from Europe, Nick comments on China’s recent announcement that it was restricting exports of germanium and gallium.

“China runs the supply chains of wind, solar, batteries, and EVs,” says Nick. “Policies in the West that mandate these things necessarily mean China then controls our grids and our roads. How’s that a good and desirable thing for us?” On a related topic, he questions a think tank’s study about the preparedness of Taiwan to withstand an attack from China—the study concluded that Taiwan should rely more on wind and solar in its grid to be better prepared for an attack from China.

In closing, Nick connects to another anniversary falling on the episode’s August 9 release date: the original 1854 publication date of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden.” Listen as Nick recounts a few of his favorite lines from Thoreau’s awesome work.

The Far Middle episode 115 arrives on August 2, 2023, which also marks the 50^th anniversary of baseball Hall of Famer George Brett’s Major League debut.

On August 2, 1973, Brett would bloop a broken-bat single in the top of the 4^th to notch his first of more than 3,000 career hits spanning 20 years with the Kansas City Royals. In dedicating the episode to Brett, Nick looks back on Brett’s quest to hit .400 in the 1980 season, the infamous 1983 pine tar incident, and reminisces on Brett’s fiery and feisty personality.

From George Brett and his dominance of the left side of the Kansas City infield, Nick connects to the Left’s dominance over many large American cities, including Portland, Oregon. “In Portland, it’s not clean, safe, or even hip anymore—it’s downright dangerous,” says Nick.

He adds that one constant during Portland’s demise has been Mayor Ted Wheeler. Wheeler’s been at the helm during Portland’s escalating homeless and violence crisis, and its eroding livability and declining economy. Read more on Portland in Precipice, specifically chapter eight, “Leech Power Centers: Urban Hell.”

Next, Nick addresses urban public education—“one of the biggest problems facing our big cities.” He cites public teachers unions protecting bad teachers as part of the problem. Using California as an example, Nick calls out that fewer than 0.002% of teachers in California are dismissed for unprofessional conduct or poor performance in any given year. Asking what or who the education system is designed to benefit, it appears the answer is poor performing teachers, public unions, and politicians.

“If you really, really wanted to improve the standing of minority students within the broader education system, don’t worry first about college admissions, instead let’s focus intensely on public education reform and choice in the K-12 arena in our big cities,” argues Nick.

While many American cities crumble, “many mayors and other leaders remain steadfast on obsessing about tackling climate change, even though the cumulative action of any city in America will have negligible impact on climate, and may in fact end up doing more harm than good,” says Nick. This leads into a data- and fact-based look on the myth of Code Red.

Staying on energy and climate, Nick spotlights research from the Copenhagen Consensus Center, wades into the Snake River and the debate on removing its dams (a source of reliable and clean hydropower), and then addresses the latest moves in the UK to allow oil and gas production to expand in the North Sea.

In closing, Nick gives the smooth sands of monotony a few more stirs as he wishes a happy birthday to the late Peter O’Toole.

The Far Middle episode 114, released on July 26, 2023, arrives the day before—in 1957—the incomparable Yogi Berra would start his streak of 148 games without an error.

The connection serves a fitting opportunity to dedicate this Far Middle installment to the legendary Lawrence Peter Berra, baseball’s “best all-around catcher.” Nick reflects on Berra’s baseball career, military service, his mentorship to young players, and more. All told it was a crazy, remarkable life—an “exemplar in absolute excellence.”

From Berra, Nick makes a unique connection, the likes of which you’ll only find on The Far Middle, discussing the Unabomber—Ted Kaczynski—who died last month in prison. Nick examines Kaczynski’s Manifesto, now nearly 30 years later: “Kaczynski was quite the ecowarrior and radical environmentalist. Back then, those environmental views, along with all his other rantings, were viewed as crazy. But today, his views on science and tech and anti-progress and the environment, they’re basically mainstream.”

Moving on, Nick adds, “When the state controls decisions, and religions of the Left like environmentalism take root in policy, the crazy becomes the norm. And it’s not just with the Unabomber Manifesto. Consider the next connection of what’s going on with Iran and energy.”

Nick dissects America’s failing appeasement approach with Iran. Appeasement leads to weakness, leading to more geopolitical risk, which has been evidenced throughout history. Nick then offers three current examples where appeasement and weakness by the U.S. and Biden administration is going to lead to major problems for the planet.

These three examples include America’s response to the escalating tensions between China and Taiwan. “China is astute,” says Nick. “It watches this clueless administration, along with Western Europe, on the issues of Iran and Russia-Ukraine, and China begins to think, I can certainly take Taiwan right now. And what is the United States or the West going to do about it?”

Discussing America’s trending decline, its lack of leadership, and the Left’s presence everywhere today, Nick comments on the Roman Empire’s decline and fall—making the case that the Empire fell from within.

Crazy is this episode’s recurring theme, which allows the episode to land on a high note as Nick presents his Mount Rushmore of best songs/compositions with crazy in the name (along with a few honorable mentions).

The Far Middle episode 113 is dedicated to legendary pitcher Cy Young who collected his 500th win on the episode’s July 19 release date back in 1910. Nick reflects on Cy Young’s stellar career and 511 wins, which Nick calls the most unbreakable record in all professional sports.

Nick describes Cy Young as the ultimate exemplar of pitching, and begins the episode’s connections, highlighting that California and Los Angeles, not long ago, were viewed by many as the exemplars of the American dream. Nick then proceeds to summarize his address last month to the Los Angeles County Lincoln Club – Downtown Chapter.

Explaining how the event came to fruition, Nick comments, “I remain fond of California and LA, and I’m deeply troubled about both, and I’m troubled about America and my hometown as well. So, I wanted to explain why to these leaders at the Lincoln Club out in Los Angeles.”

In recapping the presentation, Far Middle listeners will recognize many themes from recent episodes, such as the Left’s three-pronged attack on today’s domestic energy industry and their “convenient energy myths,” that together, result in energy scarcity, energy inflation, general inflation, and carry geopolitical consequences benefitting America’s adversaries.

During his talk, Nick reviewed topics from Precipice. He illustrates how, albeit sadly, California and Los Angeles both served as inspiration for his writing the book. After walking through his speech, Nick ends by noting one attendee’s question on how America can course correct. While America can indeed alter its course, he notes that like many once-great empires, America isn’t unbreakable.

“Yeah, there is still time to change the road we’re on, to paraphrase Robert Plant in Stairway to Heaven,” concludes Nick. “But we better move quick, or else this is not going to be a Stairway to Heaven. Instead, it’s going to be a Highway to Hell.”

The Far Middle episode 112 celebrates the Tony Zale and Rocky Graziano boxing trilogy, which spanned a 21-month period between 1946 and 1948. The middleweights’ second match—Zale vs. Graziano II—occurred this week back in 1947.

After reflecting on the Zale-Graziano bouts, which exemplified boxing done right, Nick transitions to journalism done wrong. Nick walks through a recent morning news show’s “Protecting Our Planet” segment to illustrate how media sells a problem, its causes, and its cure. In this case, the problem of course was climate change. And the cure? More government.

Staying on the so-called climate crisis, Nick offers “a little bit of history and science, which always spices up a Far Middle episode.” Nick highlights historic Earth temperature changes, going back to the Roman Warm Period, Medieval Warm Period, and the more recent Little Ice Age.

“Tackling climate change is a scheme that’s utilized in many ways by the Left as a convenient opportunity, or perhaps even a pathway, to grow the state and impose control over the individual,” says Nick. “When one thinks about what type of state control the Left prefers over society, the bigger the form of government, the better.”

Nick proceeds to delve into the idea of the Great Reset, a concept originated by World Economic Forum Chairman Klaus Schwab (aka “The Godfather of Davos”) who co-authored the book, “COVID-19: The Great Reset.”

“Schwab and the World Economic Forum and the Great Reset, they all advocate for the West to forcibly change from free market and individualistic and capitalistic, to something more along the lines of China’s form of communism,” says Nick. “Ask yourself if today’s federal government and the current bureaucratic state feel more like American capitalism or if they feel more like socialism.”

Pivoting to a state that’s all about the Great Reset, Nick highlights California’s famous and thriving Joshua Tree. The state is seeking to thwart private development as the climate change boogeyman could threaten the tree by the end of the century. Nick explains how this is the Great Reset in action: government looking for any issue as an opportunity to tighten its grip little by little, tree by tree, and house by house.

And as a U2 fan, Nick ties in an interesting connection to the band’s The Joshua Tree album, which was being recorded back in the summer of 1986. Nick examines the album’s theme, its commercial success, and present-day irony.

As episode 112 concludes, Nick predicts the Great Reset will fail in the end, but the question is how far it goes before failing, and how much damage and pain it will ultimately inflict. In closing, Nick makes one final connection to the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania that came to a climax this month back in 1794, drawing several comparisons to today.