🍀 Irish Revolutionary to Downtown Developer: Fletcher McCusker Reveals His Path from IRA Ancestry to Tucson's Urban Renaissance
How the grandson of a WPA sidewalk layer became the architect of downtown's rebirth
Based on the Buckmaster Show for 3/17/25.
😽 Keepin’ It Simple Summary for Younger Readers
👧🏾✊🏾👦🏾
🌆 Downtown Tucson is growing with new 🍽️ restaurants and 🏨 hotels, while 🧑🔬 scientists worry about big cuts to research money. Fletcher McCusker, whose 👴 grandfather built sidewalks during the Great Depression, now leads downtown development with his Rio Nuevo team. Researchers discovered 👩🔬 women speak more words than 👨 men during middle age because they do more 👨👩👧👦 family care. 🌌
Scientists at the Planetary Science Institute worry America might lose its lead in 🛰️ space exploration if the government keeps cutting money for science. People are also talking less to each other now than they did years ago because we use our 📱 phones instead of asking for directions or chatting with 🏘️ neighbors.
🗝️ Takeaways
🏙️ Downtown Tucson has doubled its tax base and attracted 1.4 million visitors to the convention center, ranking fifth nationally in attendance
🚮 A $50 million remediation cost keeps a westside landfill toxic, highlighting environmental justice concerns amid downtown development
👥 Women speak approximately 3,000 more words daily than men during middle adulthood (ages 25-65), likely due to childcare and family responsibilities
🤐 Average human daily word usage has dropped from 16,000 in 2007 to 13,000 in 2025, reflecting increasing social isolation
🚀 Potential 50% cuts to NASA's science budget could end American leadership in space science and cause a scientific "brain drain"
💰 Rio Nuevo funding has been extended to 2035, representing approximately $250 million in tax-sharing revenue over the next decade
Downtown Developments and Scientific Calamities: Settler Capitalism's Two-Faced Urban Renaissance
In the verdant atmosphere of this St. Patrick's Day broadcast, Bill Buckmaster hosted a revelatory trifecta of guests who illuminated Tucson's contradictory landscape – where local urban renewal flourishes. At the same time, national scientific ambitions wither on the vine of reactionary budget-slashing.
The stark juxtaposition between Fletcher McCusker's downtown renaissance and Dr. Mark Sykes' warnings of scientific apocalypse offers a microcosm of America's schizophrenic relationship with progress – celebrating capitalist development with one hand while strangling intellectual advancement with the other.
Fletcher McCusker: The Revolutionary's Grandson Builds Capitalist Dreams
The show kicked off with Fletcher McCusker, chair of the Rio Nuevo District, whose family history reads like an Irish revolutionary ballad suddenly interrupted by the American dream. On this emerald-hued holiday, McCusker revealed his unexpected connection to the Irish Republican Army, sharing how his son discovered the family's patriotic status during a Dublin tour bus ride.
"Your family founded the IRA, your Patriots," the Irish bus driver declared after learning the McCusker name, a revelation later confirmed when Fletcher and his wife visited Belfast, where they learned that British forces assassinated Seamus McCusker on a Belfast street.
"He's a martyr there," McCusker explained, describing visits to unmarked IRA graveyards and divided Belfast neighborhoods where his ancestral name still carries revolutionary weight in some quarters and provokes hostility in others. "They said they don't take too kindly to your name, so here is your Jones... this is a Protestant bar."
How fascinating that the descendant of Irish revolutionaries fighting British colonialism now spearheads what some might call the gentrification of indigenous and Mexican-American spaces in downtown Tucson. The colonial wheel turns, and yesterday's freedom fighters become today's developers.
The irony deepens when McCusker reveals his grandfather came to Tucson in 1929 during the Depression to lay sidewalks for the Works Progress Administration. "He laid sidewalks, that's the irony," McCusker noted, explaining that his grandfather's dollar-a-day labor built the very downtown foundations his grandson would later capitalize upon. The WPA sidewalks around the University of Arizona and downtown still bear the imprint "WPA 1935"—literal concrete evidence of how public works provided the infrastructure that private enterprise would later monetize.
"When we opened our company downtown, we jackhammered out a piece of that sidewalk, and it became my desk," McCusker revealed, perhaps unintentionally creating the perfect metaphor for late-stage capitalism – executive furniture fashioned from the dismantled remnants of New Deal public works.
McCusker's updates on downtown Tucson paint a picture of thriving urban revitalization: "Our revenue's never been higher, we doubled the tax base which is our job." The district has launched some 45 restaurants, relocated companies, and developed new hotels and residential units. Yet these successes come with casualties: "You're starting to see some things fail. High-Fi closed roughly just a few weeks ago. Hub shut down to totally remodel."
The invisible hand of the market picks winners and losers. However, the Rio Nuevo board seems to have its thumb firmly on the scale, directing millions in public tax dollars toward private development—creative destruction, as the capitalist apologists love to call it.
The Tucson Convention Center, soon to receive a corporate-branded name (because nothing says "public space" like corporate branding), welcomed 1.4 million visitors last year. "It's the fifth-ranked in the United States for attendance," McCusker boasted. When you think about who we compete with—Vegas, San Diego, LA, Chicago—we're doing great."
Yet amidst this celebration of downtown's rebirth, McCusker revealed a festering environmental injustice on Tucson's west side – an unremediated landfill requiring $50 million to clean up. "The stakeholders over there want that to remain open space," McCusker explained, conveniently sidestepping the question of why a toxic dump exists in a predominantly working-class area. At the same time, downtown receives millions in public investment. "Unfortunately, it's going to remain a landfill."
How convenient that environmental remediation costs are deemed prohibitive when they benefit marginalized communities, yet millions flow freely to incentivize downtown hotels and restaurants. The invisible hand of the market seems remarkably visible when directing resources toward tourist attractions rather than environmental justice.
Dr. Matthias Mel: The Gender Revolution in Our Speech Patterns
The conversation pivoted to Dr. Matthias Mel, a University of Arizona psychologist whose research dismantles gender stereotypes about verbal communication. His comprehensive study debunks the popular myth that women universally out-talk men by a factor of three (20,000 words versus 7,000 words daily).
"This stereotype exists in Chinese proverbs and Irish proverbs and all these things," Mel explained. "It's really interesting that there are widespread assumptions that women out-talk men by a factor."
Using sophisticated recording devices to sample daily conversations, Mel's team captured over 600,000 thirty-second sound bites from more than 2,000 participants across different age groups. The results shattered conventional wisdom: minimal differences existed between men and women in adolescent years and older adulthood, with women speaking only about 500 more words daily in these age brackets.
However, in middle adulthood (ages 25-65), women speak approximately 3,000 more words daily than men – a significant difference that Mel attributes not to biology but to social roles. "Our best guess at the moment is that this is not speaking to a biological difference... but specifically the difference is due to women engaging more in that age in child-rearing and family care."
No surprise there – the mental load and emotional labor of maintaining family relationships falls disproportionately on women, who must coordinate schedules, manage household dynamics, and perform the invisible work of keeping families functioning while men enjoy the privilege of laconic detachment.
Perhaps most disturbing was Mel's revelation about society's collective verbal recession: "When we published the number of how many words humans speak on average in a day, in 2007, we estimate 16,000. And then we redid it in 2025, and now we estimate 13,000 words."
This 3,000-word decline represents approximately "300 daily spoken words per year that we have lost," reflecting what Mel connects to the "social isolation loneliness epidemic" identified by the Surgeon General. "We don't surround ourselves as many people anymore. We don't invite friends over as readily anymore... We pull out our smartphone, and we look for directions there."
The atomization of society under late capitalism continues apace – human connection sacrificed at the altar of technological convenience. As we retreat into our digital bubbles, capitalism extracts profit from our isolation while community withers and language itself atrophies.
Dr. Mark Sykes: Scientific Armageddon Under Reactionary Rule
The show's final segment delivered a chilling assessment of American scientific research from Dr. Mark Sykes, CEO and Director of Tucson's Planetary Science Institute. Like a planetary scientist tracking an extinction-level asteroid, Sykes described the impending impact of the administration's scientific budget cuts with unflinching clarity.
"The White House is saying there may be slashing the budget for NASA, the science budget by 50%," Buckmaster noted, to which Sykes confirmed: "That was the rumor at this conference I was at last week, and of course,e if that happens it would be devastating to American space science and we would no longer be the lead in the world."
The consequences extend beyond prestige to a potential "brain drain" of scientific talent. When asked where scientists might go, Sykes replied bluntly: "It'd be a real smart time for some other nations that could really use a pickup in the science but are good on the engineering to grab some top-flight labor."
The chaos extends beyond budget cuts to arbitrary personnel decisions, creating organizational havoc. "When you just randomly fire people out of an agency, whatever agency it is, then it just means that you're losing the capability for doing a lot of stuff that you're doing, and so you're going to be doing a worse job and it's going to cost more."
The supposed fiscal conservatives reveal their true agenda – not efficiency or cost-effectiveness, but the deliberate sabotage of public institutions and scientific advancement. The party of "American greatness" seems determined to ensure America's scientific irrelevance.
Sykes delivered his assessment with barely contained rage: "Our basic research is foundational to the new technologies and new economies and new health initiatives that we have been leaders in the world for a long time, and it's going to bring all of that to an end. I'm kind of stunned at the extent to which American greatness, if you will, has been vanishing so rapidly, and it will go away."
When pressed on whether there's any good news, Sykes mentioned a recent successful commercial lunar landing and innovative AI applications in planetary science. But these victories stand on increasingly shaky ground.
Most damning was Sykes' assessment of the administration's true motives: "It's not for the purposes stated because that's clear. It's for people lining their own pockets, and they're not people like you or me or your listeners."
The kleptocratic pillaging of America's scientific infrastructure proceeds apace, transferring public resources to private hands while our scientific leadership crumbles. We're witnessing the fire sale of America's intellectual future, with foreign powers ready to scoop up our displaced scientists like bargain shoppers at a going-out-of-business sale.
Sykes drew a historical parallel that should chill every patriotic American: "After World War II, we talked about 'our Germans'... I really see that in just one, two years even that people could be talking about 'our Americans'" – referring to the post-war recruitment of German scientists by the US and Soviet Union, a scenario now potentially reversing with American scientists fleeing to more scientifically hospitable nations.
The Two Faces of American Progress
Today's Buckmaster Show reveals America's Jekyll-and-Hyde relationship with progress – one face smiling at downtown development while the other grimaces at scientific advancement. We celebrate the remaking of urban spaces through public-private partnerships while simultaneously dismantling the research infrastructure that powers our technological future.
The contradictions are glaring: we can find millions to subsidize hotel developments but deem environmental cleanup costs prohibitive. We analyze gender communication patterns with sophisticated technology while potentially sending our brightest scientific minds overseas due to ideologically motivated budget cuts.
As McCusker celebrates downtown's rebirth and expansion reaching as far east as Park Place Mall, Sykes mourns the potential collapse of America's scientific leadership. As men become increasingly taciturn while women shoulder the verbal load of family maintenance, our collective vocabulary shrinks by thousands of words annually.
The cognitive dissonance is staggering – we'll gladly pour public resources into commercially viable spaces while letting environmental justice languish and scientific research wither. The invisible hand of the market seems remarkably selective about which problems it solves and which it perpetuates.
Yet, within this contradictory landscape, hope remains. The resilience displayed by Fletcher McCusker's family across generations – from IRA revolutionaries to WPA workers to downtown developers – reminds us that determination can overcome even the darkest times. Perhaps this same revolutionary spirit can help us weather the current storm threatening American scientific leadership.
Taking Action: Preserving Progress in Reactionary Times
We cannot stand idle while scientific infrastructure is dismantled for ideological gain. Consider these actions:
Support organizations like the Planetary Science Institute that provide refuge for scientists displaced from government agencies
Demand that your representatives protect research funding and scientific independence
Attend public meetings about downtown development to ensure that revitalization benefits all communities, including addressing environmental injustices like unremediated landfills
Consciously increase your daily verbal interactions – fight the trend of social isolation by engaging more frequently in face-to-face conversations
What role should local governments play when federal scientific funding is threatened? Should communities like Tucson develop local science investment funds to retain scientific talent when national priorities shift?
How can we ensure downtown development addresses historical environmental injustices rather than perpetuating them? Is it just to celebrate downtown's renaissance while toxic landfills remain in marginalized communities?
Share your thoughts in the comments below – your voice matters in this crucial conversation about our collective future.
Quotes:
"Your family founded the IRA, your Patriots." - Irish tour bus driver to Fletcher McCusker's son, revealing the family's connection to the Irish Republican Army
"When we opened our company downtown, we jackhammered out a piece of that sidewalk, and it became my desk." - Fletcher McCusker, describing how he repurposed his grandfather's WPA work into office furniture
"The stakeholders over there want that to remain open space... unfortunately,y it's going to remain a landfill." - Fletcher McCusker, explaining why a $50 million westside environmental cleanup won't happen
"Our best guess at the moment is that this is not speaking to a biological difference... but specifically the difference is due to women engaging more in that age in child-rearing and family care." - Dr. Matthias Mel on why women speak more than men in middle adulthood
"Our basic research is foundational to the new technologies and new economies and new health initiatives that we have been leaders in the world for a long time, and it's going to bring all of that to an end." - Dr. Mark Sykes on the impact of science budget cuts
"It's not for the purposes stated because that's clear. It's for people lining their own pockets, and they're not people like you or me or your listeners." - Dr. Mark Sykes on the true motivation behind scientific budget cuts
"After World War II we talked about 'our Germans'... I really see that in just one, two years even that people could be talking about 'our Americans'" - Dr. Mark Sykes, warning of a reversal of scientific brain drain
People Mentioned:
Bill Buckmaster - Host of the Buckmaster Show, interviewing guests about downtown development, gender linguistics, and scientific funding
Fletcher McCusker - Chair of the Rio Nuevo District and downtown Tucson developer with Irish Republican Army ancestry: "Seamus McCusker was assassinated by the British on an Irish street on a Belfast street, they took us to the very spot, he's a martyr there"
Seamus McCusker - Fletcher's ancestor, an IRA martyr assassinated by British forces in Belfast
Dr. Matthias Mel - University of Arizona psychologist who researched gender differences in verbal communication: "When we published the number of how many words humans speak on average in a day, in 2007, we estimate 16,000. And then we redid it in 2025, and now we estimate 13,000 words"
Dr. Mark Sykes - CEO and Director of the Tucson-based Planetary Science Institute, warning about scientific funding cuts: "If that happens, it would be devastating to American space science, and we would no longer be the lead in the world."
Mayor Walkup - Former Tucson mayor mentioned in relation to early convention center development challenges
