Jacob All Trades #337
McDonald's and Democracy, Legal Eagle, Doctor Odyssey, CA Ballot Measures, Subway Creatures
MCDONALD’S ICE CREAM AND DEMOCRACY
Why are broken McFlurries the perfect example of how our country could work? Stick with me…I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. Do you know how McDonald’s never seems to have ice cream? It’s on the menu, but the machine always seems to be broken. This happens so frequently that over the last decade, it’s become the subject of thousands of memes.
There’s even a site called McBroken that aggregates which machines are working on a giant map.
To me, McDonald’s ice cream is a perfect illustration of the broken promises of corporate America. We’re sold a bill of goods — from restaurants, airlines, insurance companies, you name it — and once we’re on the hook, the service is shit. It’s the enshittification of corporate America: things that used to work for people simply don’t anymore.
In almost every instance, the reason things don’t work is straightforward corporate greed. Someone prioritized profits over people. You may be thinking to yourself, “Self, why would broken ice cream machines help McDonald’s make money off me? Surely, they’d make more money by selling me ice cream.”
But that’s not how McDonald’s makes money. McDonald’s makes money by franchising locations to small business owners — not by selling you food. The franchisees hope to profit from consumers, but the corporation is essentially a real estate holder. A third party, Taylor Company, makes McDonald’s ice cream machines, sells them to franchise owners for about $18k and refuses to tell them anything about the way they work. When they break down, there aren’t simple ways for the store employees to fix them, so a different third party — a company called Kytch — made a gadget that could be inserted in the machines to help McD managers troubleshoot them. I’m not gonna get in the weeds too much here, but check out this WIRED article for the details.
The analogy goes deeper. Trump, who, to his credit, always has his finger on the pulse of real people’s gripes, made a joke about how he was going to fix the ice cream machines at his recent minimum-wage cosplay (where btw he stiffed the local franchise owner on the bill). While he was grabbing headlines with bluster…. Democrats actually fixed the problem.
Lina Khan, the Biden-appointed chair of the FTC, fought for the U.S. Copyright Office to introduce a new exemption allowing small business owners and franchisees, including McDonald's operators, the "right to repair" their machinery. This change stems from the FTC's earlier efforts to extend repair rights for commercial equipment. If this sounds somewhat familiar, it’s because another massive victory happened last year when the FTC required John Deere to let farmers fix their own equipment after Biden signed an executive order calling on the FTC to create a country-wide policy to allow customers to repair their own products.
Trump and Elon Musk’s plan for a $2 trillion cut to the federal budget would eliminate the FTC (and many other watchdogs).
The reality is that government has the power to make our lives suck less. Under the last four years of Biden/Harris and the proposals of Harris/Walz, government agencies like the FTC have been and would continue to be staffed by dedicated public servants — policy wonks and justice nerds like Khan. Billionaires and corporations want us to focus on identity politics because if you’re freaking out about how scary a “they/them” pronoun is, you won’t realize how much the corporations are getting away with.
And it’s not just ice cream… here are some of the things Democrats have done over the last four years (and that Harris is proposing) to make things suck less:
Internet For All (including requiring ISPs to provide service to rural areas)
Investigating Landlord Price Fixing Schemes That Harms Millions of Renters
And, if you’re traveling for the holidays over the next month, another one just went into effect this past week thanks to Pete Buttigieg and the DOT:
Why aren’t these (and the dozens of other victories for everyday people) bigger stories? Our social and news media have a financial interest in rage-baiting all of us to argue about the issues that divide us. I believe this financial incentive exists because if it didn’t, we’d all realize there are simple issues that 70-80% of Americans agree on, that we can fix easily, and that would stop billionaires and corporations from strip-mining the middle class for profits. What do you think?
CONSUMPTION JUNCTION
Three things I’ve read or watched recently that stuck with me.
Doctor Odyssey is the kind of good/bad TV that nearly defies explanation. I say “nearly” because Lucy Mangan’s review in The Guardian defines it pretty well. Here are some snippets: “I want you to understand – this is a show with Shania Twain as a guest star playing a character listed as “Grandma” on IMDb”
“…at the centre of everything, it has Joshua Jackson performing some kind of miracle; playing his part in absolute good faith, pitching it perfectly no matter what new narrative or tonal bonkersness is unfolding round him, grounding it somehow, and yet transcending it at the same time. It is a wondrous thing. I can’t take my eyes off him. It’s the greatest, most extended magic trick ever.” ⤵️
The very dry and risk-averse YouTube channel Legal Eagle is making a presidential endorsement. They don’t do this lightly, so if you’re open to hearing a very pragmatic, non-partisan group explain who you should vote for and why, check it out. ⤵️
Bernie Sanders’ video about how he can disagree with Harris about Gaza and still support her. ⤵️
BEAUTIFUL DATA
One of my favorite graphical interpretations of California’s confusingly written ballot measures is BACK! Ballot.fyi, by creative technologist Jimmy Chion, is a nonpartisan guide that breaks down each ballot measure without bias. This year, it’s a little less visual, taking the style of text messages.
If you’re looking for more detailed info, the nonpartisan CalMatters has you covered. And, if you want to know what progressives are supporting, Knock LA has all the CA measures plus local races.
I COULD WATCH THIS ALL DAY
Instagram favorite Subway Creatures posted this round up of people taking public transit with bulky or ridiculous costumes.
Alrighty, that’s it for this issue. If you enjoyed what you read, please leave a comment and/or share the newsletter using the links below.
Party on,
Jacob