The White House Was One Petty Congressman Away From Becoming Versailles

Plus, The New Paris Hotel Where You Can Sleep Under the Stars

Manage newsletters View in browser The entire world in your inbox. Hello all—   Over the past few weeks, I've been giddily rifling through William Seale's two-volume history of the White House. You can just open up to any presidency and it's filled with long-forgotten juicy stories that in all honesty make our present era seem tame by comparison. While I'd seen random blog posts over the years about almost-built White Houses, reading Seale I got a taste of the richness of the tale of First Lady Caroline Harrison's attempt at a White House expansion—and just how close it came to happening! I think you'll all enjoy the feature I posted on all the drama, with assistance from the Harrison Historical Site in Indianapolis and the Library of Congress. My hope is that this historical background will add new depth to your next visit to D.C.   This week we also have a gripping, but troubling read from Clive Irving on just what exactly went wrong at Boeing that led to the 737 MAX failure. Clive's insight and reporting is unequivocal—the root of the company's misdeeds can be traced to the cult of Jack Welch, the legendary head of GE.   Finally, for all the Greek mythology nerds out there, don't miss Peter Fiennes' piece on the ways you can still experience ancient Greece in the country today— perfect for you.    Enjoy!   —William O'Connor, Travel Editor The White House Was One Petty Congressman Away From Becoming Versailles For decades, most White House occupants thought it was a glorified dump. One First Lady nearly succeeded in turning it into a palace. The New Paris Hotel Where You Can Sleep Under the Stars Housed in one of the city's storied government buildings, Madame Rêve will have its guests looking up more than the average Paris hotel. How Boeing Was Set on the Path to Disaster by the Cult of Jack Welch The once-great company was gutted by a series of bosses who put making money ahead of making airplanes–and 346 people died. Now a new book adds to the list of damning indictments. These Places from Greek Mythology Still Exist—and You Can Visit It is thrilling to be able to visit the places where the Greek myths emerged, from the kingdom of Mycenae to the village where Zeus and Prometheus cut a deal. Protect Your Smallest Treasures With the Away Hard-Shelled Mini Scouting Report: With travel restrictions lifting, feelings of wanderlust are likely to surface. When you are ready to hit the road, you'll need some luggage sturdy enough to keep up with your flyer miles. That's where the Away luggage comes in.   Why is it that tiny versions of normally big things are always so damn cute?   Take the Away Mini, back in stock for the holiday season. It doesn't have a handle, wheels, or a removable battery, but it does have the classic polycarbonate shell of a big Away suitcase, just in a smaller package.   The Mini is designed to help organize and protect your small belongings, like toiletries, headphones, jewelry, whathaveyou. It comes in 16 (!) different colors and is honestly the perfect companion to any suitcase, Away or otherwise. The interior mesh pocket and elastic strap can help secure things like razors, pens, serums, and more. It even has an exterior D ring so you can attach your keys so they don't end up in the bowels of your larger bag. At under 7" tall, this is a great alternative to the soft sides of a packing cube, in case you need some extra bump-proof protection.    Away creates thoughtful travel essentials to ensure your journey is stress-free, and that you have a designated space for every little thing you'll need on the way there and back. The team is made up of passionate travelers stationed all over the world, and the pieces they create are direct-to-consumer, made from the same quality materials as premium luggage.   — Scouted by Jillian Lucas SHOP AT AWAY >>> "While recording what would become their last studio album in 1969, the Beatles did a final one-off show on the roof of Apple Corps headquarters in London. That now-iconic performance, however, came close to being filmed in the ruins of a Roman theater in North Africa." —historian Candida Moss gives us the tale of how a magnificent site in Libya's current troubled state might mean more to the world if the Beatles had performed there. OMG I Want This House!      December is here, which means it's time to start figuring out where you will be summering in 2022. We're assuming that, like us, this means you are currently stressed about which new Hamptons property you will be acquiring. (Oh, the life we live in our dreams…) If that's the case, may we introduce you to The Up Studio-designed Harbor Hideaway, the architectural Helen that is sure to start the next Hamptons bidding war. (After all, winning the new love of your real estate portfolio's life tastes so much sweeter when there's competition.)   Sag Harbor was originally a whaling village. Though the industry has been banned in the U.S. and the original whalers probably wouldn't recognize their old neighborhood, we won't judge if, like us and the fair lad pictured here, you are trying to catch yourself a whale of a more modern species in order to afford this $4.5 mil Long Island prize.   Contemporary, but right at home in the local landscape. The Harbor House is sure to be the 2022 summer envy of all your very tasteful neighbors.    Don't miss previous OMG, I Want to Rent This House posts, which spotlight the most spectacular and unique homes that you can actually stay in.  Check out the full archives.  Travel to France's Most Over-the-Top Private Home   It's a palace with one of the greatest tales in French history—a minister overshadowing his king only to be pulled down to nothing. That's the long and short of Nicolas Fouqet, King Louis XIV, and the fabulous Vaux-le-Vicomte, a chateau south of Paris that is the subject of a delightful new coffee table book from Flammarion, Vaux le Vicomte: A Private Invitation. The book is the latest selection for our series on gorgeous new travel related coffee table books, Just Booked. Despite its thrilling backstory and its central role in the development of French style—the architect (Le Vau), decorator (Le Brun), and landscape designer (Le Notre) all went on to design Versailles—Vaux-le-Vicomte doesn't have the same grip on the popular tourist imagination as other French chateaux.    This new tome, with text from Guillaume Picon and photographs by Bruno Ehrs, will hopefully change that. The rooms captured are sumptuous and the vistas arresting—few rooms have ever competed with the oval Grand Salon looking out over Le Notre's Baroque gardens. What is amazing is that the house is still in private hands, those of the de Vogüé family.   Check out our previous selections for our series on gorgeous travel-related coffee table books, Just Booked. 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The Kids Aren't All Right

Anxious Adolescents, Year in News Photos

Tuesday, December 7, 2021 - The Day's Most Fascinating News from Dave Pell

Subscribe Store Current Share Archives Tuesday, December 7, 2021 1 THE KIDS AREN'T ALL RIGHT Being an adolescent and going through life's various transitions and experiences is difficult enough. Going through those tumultuous years in the middle of a pandemic is really rough. That's what you'd imagine, that's what you're likely seeing among the young people you know, and that's what the numbers are indicating. "Symptoms of depression and anxiety have doubled during the pandemic, with 25% of youth experiencing depressive symptoms and 20% experiencing anxiety symptoms." It's important that journalists cover this issue for a few reasons. First, the onslaught of bad news about divisive behavior alienates all of us, so it's definitely alienating young people. The media should be honest about its role in stressing people out. And second, because covering these trends removes the stigma around mental health challenges. I see too many young people hammering themselves for being bummed during challenging times. That's what the depression wants you to do. It's ok to not be ok. And these days, it's entirely understandable.     2 EXIT RAMPING "Gaining courage from social media, the most vulnerable people in America have started the closest thing we've seen in a century to a general strike ... Workers are quitting across the labor force; people I've talked to range from minimum-wage employees to senior executives. But quit rates and job-to-job transitions in the Great Resignation are mostly taking place among workers with less than a high school education, whose daily toil is typically spent in dead-end low-wage jobs, an engine for corporate profits that produces some of the grimmer existences in the industrialized world." David Dayen in The American Prospect: The Great Escape.     3 KRAINE WRECK "Face to face for just over two hours, President Joe Biden and Russia's Vladimir Putin squared off in a secure video call Tuesday as the U.S. president put Moscow on notice that a Russian invasion of Ukraine would bring enormous harm to the Russian economy." + "Ukrainian and Western officials are worried that a Russian military buildup near Ukraine could signal plans by Moscow to invade its ex-Soviet neighbor. The Kremlin insists it has no such intention and has accused Ukraine and its Western backers of making the claims to cover up their own allegedly aggressive designs." Explainer: What's behind Russia-Ukraine tensions?     4 PHARMACY NO EVIL "On 14 June 2021, a reporter for KGO-TV in San Francisco tweeted a cellphone video of a man in Walgreens filling a garbage bag with stolen items and riding his bicycle out of the store. According to San Francisco's crime database, the value of the merchandise stolen in the incident was between $200 and $950 ... In most coverage, the video is presented as proof that there are no consequences for shoplifting in San Francisco. But the man in the video, Jean Lugo-Romero, was arrested about a week later and faces 15 charges." You hear a lot about people stealing from Walgreens. You hear nothing about Walgreens stealing from people. "Just a few months earlier, in November 2020, Walgreens paid a $4.5m settlement to resolve a class-action lawsuit alleging that it stole wages from thousands of its employees in California." Judd Legum: Want to be a criminal in America? Stealing billions is your best bet to go scot-free.     5 TRUST SHUNNED Vaccine hesitancy is frustrating. But it's a worldwide phenomenon. Olga Khazan in The Atlantic on What's Really Behind Global Vaccine Hesitancy. "Something as complex as vaccine hesitancy is bound to have many causes, but research suggests that one fundamental instinct drives it: A lack of trust. Getting people to overcome their hesitancy will require restoring their trust in science, their leaders, and, quite possibly, one another. The crisis of vaccine hesitancy and the crisis of cratering trust in institutions are one and the same." + So it makes sense that the hesitancy around vaccine advice would extend to other areas of health. NPR: The NIH director on why Americans aren't getting healthier, despite medical advances.     6 IT'S HARD TO FIND A GOOD DEV THESE DAYS Trump has appointed someone to blame when his media company goes bankrupt: Devin Nunes. (Imagine starting a company and realizing Devin Nunes is the best guy that will agree to run it.) + The Guy Who Tried to Sue a Fake Twitter Cow Is Going to Lead Trump's Media Company. + Mark Meadows to halt cooperation with January 6 committee. (Trump didn't like his book and got mad, so to make up for it, he pulled out of cooperating ... which is something we're learning one gets to do when it comes to Congressional subpoenas.)     7 ERRAND BOY SENT BY GROCERY CLERKS TO COLLECT A BILL "When we think of resource frontiers, it calls to mind the rugged, glamorous classics: oil booms, gold rushes, or, in the not-so-distant future, asteroid mining. But the latest is closer to home. Whether you live in Manhattan, Hollywood, or beyond, the storefronts and sidewalks in your city are being mined." But it's not as fun as it sounds. City Lab: The Dark Side of 15-Minute Grocery Delivery. "Mini-warehouses dubbed 'dark stores' are quietly taking over urban retail space. Left unregulated, the insatiable demand for faster delivery will only hasten the erosion of community life." Some days at San Francisco supermarkets, it seems like its just me and delivery folks picking up other people's groceries. I'll never feel comfortable letting someone else choose which head of lettuce is right for me.     8 PHOTO FINISH "The breach of the U.S. Capitol on January 6 set the stage for a contentious year in the United States, and COVID-19 variants and regional surges slowed worldwide efforts to return to pre-pandemic life." Here's a look a the top 25 news photos of the year. I think volcanos deserve the award from best photograph creators. The photos from La Palma have been incredible. And look at these scenes following an eruption on the island of Java.     9 INDIANA JONESING "An American hedge-fund billionaire has surrendered 180 looted and illegally smuggled antiquities valued at $70m and been handed an unprecedented lifetime ban on acquiring other relics." He had to give it back and not buy any more stolen property? He's lucky he didn't rob a Walgreens.     10 BOTTOM OF THE NEWS "Every day, one million people upload pictures of their coffee grinds to the Turkish app Faladdin and get a personalised fortune reading back in 15 minutes ... Beauty livestreamer Li Jiaqi sold $1.9 billion worth of products in one twelve hour show on Taobao ... Clean rooms used to make semiconductors have to be 1,000x cleaner than a surgical operating theatre, because a single transistor is now much smaller than a virus." Those are just three items from Tom Whitwell's always entertaining annual list. 52 things I learned in 2021.     Thanks, Dave Pell Managing Editor, Internet Subscribe Store Current Share Archives NextDraft 600 Harrison Street, San Francisco, CA 94107 You are receiving this because you signed up for Dave Pell's Next Draft newsletter. If you'd like to stop receiving these emails, simply unsubscribe. No hard feelings. If this email isn't looking quite right, you can view it in your browser. 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