The Covid Zeitgeist

 

Mr. Spock gives the Vulcan salute (left) and the Thai “Wai” greeting.

Cures for Getting Past Corona

How We Can Live Long and Prosper

(This article was written on April 23, 2020)

On countless episodes of “Star Trek” (the original series) the crew of the Enterprise or the population of some distant and exotic planet would find themselves afflicted by some new and heretofore unknown virus or malady that threatens the lives of the crew or even of humanity as a whole. It could be premature and rapid old age, grotesque lesions that drive a man mad, parasites that take over one’s nervous system or even a giant-sized single-celled organism that swallows whole planets. One thing that they all had in common was that a cure would inevitably be found between the fourth and final commercial breaks. There would be much suspense as Dr. McCoy and Mr. Spock brought all their brainpower and computer skills to bear but the cure was a forgone conclusion.

In real life there are very few magic potions or miracle pills. Humanity has made enormous strides in medicine and surgical procedures over the past century – so much so that we routinely see folks living deep into their 90s. When I was a kid, I never saw anyone who was 95, most folks were lucky to get to 75. This is one reason Social Security is tottering on the brink of bankruptcy – people were supposed to retire at 65 and live maybe to 72. The system wasn’t engineered to pay 30 years of benefits. That often four generations of a family can be alive at the same time is probably unprecedented in human history. This is a real blessing, but it also has lulled us into a false sense of physical invulnerability and the chimera of eternal youth.

Prior generations knew and accepted that life was often short and fraught with threats and dangers from all sides. If you were lucky to survive your early childhood, you had to fend off no end of diseases throughout your lifetime – maladies for which there were no cures. Prior generations accepted the risks attendant with daily life and went about their business. They weren’t hysterical people. But in today’s instantaneous nanosecond digital world, that we don’t “have an app for that,” has caused no end of panic worldwide.

Which brings me to the Coronavirus pandemic afflicting most of the world. In 1982 there was a hit song by Thomas Dolby called “She Blinded Me With Science,” (“She blinded me with science and failed me in biology, yeh yeh…”). The woman of Mr. Dolby’s infatuations, Ms. Sakamoto dazzled him with technology so that he was helpless in her hands. Much the same has occurred with our national and local political leaders. Despite the fact that the Chinese insisted that only about 83,000 people in Wuhan had the Coronavirus and only 3,300 died from it (which we now know to have been lies) the scientists across the globe predicted Bubonic Plague-like catastrophic mortalities as it made its way round the world. One study asserted 2.2 million people would die in the US and a half million in the UK. Revised models dropped down to 200,000 in the US, then 100,000, then 85,000 then 61,000.

The initial and ensuing panic prodded our leaders to put the entire country in a lockdown quarantine which has so far resulted in 26 million Americans applying for unemployment benefits as of April 23^rd, wiping out all jobs created and gained since the 2008 recession. Whole sectors of the economy have been decimated – travel, hospitality, restaurants, retailers, publishing, sports, oil and energy and even vast swaths of the health and medical establishment with more industries to come. Education has been stopped cold. Mighty industries are dancing on the precipice of insolvency. The shutdown of the most populated parts of the country will end up being from 45 to 90 days depending on where you live. Thousands que-up in lines for boxes of food despite very generous unemployment benefits. The federal government has ramped-up spending to a level that may double the size of the federal budget this year and incur debt and deficits that multiple generations probably won’t be able to repay.

Never in my lifetime have I ever seen anything quite like this, and I’m 61. The very social fabric of our country has been torn asunder with the rationale of “flattening the curve.” Some in the media commentariat have led millions of Americans to believe that “curve flattening” is about saving hundreds of thousands of lives and if we emerge from our hermetically sealed shelters the virus may kill us all. But they’ve not closed down Sweden or Hong Kong and the world didn’t end.

I had occasion to speak with one of my doctors who is one of the top people in his field in the nation. He converses regularly with colleagues of similar stature in other specialties. He told me bluntly that “flattening the curve was about reducing the demand for ambulances, emergency rooms and intensive care facilities and equipment as the virus hit its apex” and not about reducing the number of cases or saving lives per-se. He went on to tell me that as a result of this the disease will continue in our midst probably for the next year and a half in some form or another in varying degrees of severity, with a dip in the late Spring and Summer (owing to the virus not surviving well in the air and on surfaces in intense heat and light) and a resurgence in the late Fall and coming Winter and beyond. He went on to say that “there will be no cure or vaccine for another year, two or three or maybe never” and that “the medical community is looking at Corona in a similar way to HIV/AIDS, in that there is no cure but enough palliative medication and treatments have been developed so that the infection is not lethal.” They hope to accomplish this for SARS-Covid-19 as well so that the most vulnerable people (folks over 65, those with compromised immune systems and other underlying preexisting medical conditions such as diabetes) won’t contract Coronavirus and a death sentence simultaneously.

As it is, the overwhelming number of tragic fatalities from Covid-19 have been for people over 50 with a heavy majority being over 65 and among those, a heavy mortality rate among the obese and people with other existing ailments. More than 95 percent of those testing positive for Coronavirus will survive it, thank God. It’s not going to kill 2 million Americans. Also, most viral epidemics (yes, including the Bubonic Plague and the Spanish Flu Pandemic) do and will burn themselves out eventually which is why we’re seeing a precipitous decline in new hospital and ICU admissions even in our hottest spots.

So where does this leave us? Well, as a society until just recently we’ve been accepting of the fact that not every illness has a cure. We have a flu shot each year, but it’s only 50-60 percent effective so that according to the CDC, between 39 and 56 million Americans will come down with the flu, up to 740,000 people will be hospitalized for it and that between 24,000 and 61,000 of us will die from it each year depending on the severity of the outbreak and the mutation. Heart disease fells 647,000 of us (one of every four deaths).

According to the American Cancer Society, there will be 606,520 cancer deaths in the United States in 2020. The CDC also reports that 83,564 Americans passed from diabetes.  The IIHS reports that 36,560 people died in car crashes in 2018. As of April 23^rd, 49,885 of us perished from the Coronavirus. There are no cures for any of these things.

We take risks every day we get up, start the car and go to work; anytime we get on a plane, anytime we eat a fatty steak, delve into a tub of ice cream; anytime we have a drink of alcohol, anytime we cross the street, even anytime we shake hands or kiss someone. As adults we measure the risk-reward ratio for all our actions and decide if it’s worth it. As consenting adults, the government trusts us to live responsibly (or not) and doesn’t dictate that we can’t have that hamburger and wash it down with a pitcher of beer. The government doesn’t legislate our sex lives and doesn’t tell us not to drive because we may, heaven forbid, get into an accident.

So, we’ve “flattened the curve” on Corona to the extent that ERs are sitting empty in much of the country. We’re awash in ventilators. The virus will be with us for a while. The government needs to give us a “get out of jail free card” or release us on parole and let us resume our lives. How do we do this and stay safe? By “turning Japanese.” I used to laugh at all the pictures of Asians teeming together in their blue facemasks every winter. No longer. Many would laugh at their custom of bowing in greeting, but it’s a lot safer than shaking hands. In Tibet folks put their hands over their hearts (like when we say the Pledge of Allegiance) and in Thailand instead of shaking hands, Thais greet each other by putting their hands together in a prayer-like gesture and raising them to a position somewhere between the chest and forehead and then bowing. On “Star Trek,” Vulcans greet one another with their hand raised in that “V” or “W” made popular by Mr. Spock and urging the other person to “live long and prosper.”

That might be the way to go. Masks and gloves when out in public. Initially not cramming together like sardines. Use those new digital laser-like thermometers outside every venue to see if someone has fever. Also, for social distancing in travel, airlines could charge more to keep the middle seats empty. Many would pay for the privilege. Ditto with restaurants charging more for increased space between tables. Theaters and sports stadiums can do likewise, charge a premium for increased space. And we’re going to need more hospitals and more beds permanently, so we won’t need curve flattening.

But we must resume work and life or there will be no point in living because there will be no quality of life. Staying on lockdown will financially bankrupt us individually and collectively, this cannot be sustained. Memo to government: We voluntarily acceded to flattening the curve, now treat us like adults and let life resume. Coronavirus will join the panoply of other risks and dangers that we’ll have to live with each day, but we can’t shut the country down any longer or whenever a lot of people unfortunately get sick. Finally, a financially robust America will be better equipped to handle public health challenges more so than an anemic and bankrupt one.

The Zeitgeist

Will the real Judy please sit down? That's Zellweger on the right.

Movies for Solitary Confinement

This appeared in print and online around April 1, 2020 during the Corona Virus Lockdown.

Since most of us have been forced into “solitary confinement” due to the onset of the viral apocalypse there are a lot of hours to fill when not trying to work or trying not to overeat (good luck with that!). Because most every professional and amateur sport has been cancelled, this leaves movies and TV to fill much of the gap.

The profusion of choices is practically paralyzing. When I was young (in the 60s and 70s when dinosaurs roamed the earth) we had just a handful of TV channels and networks and there always seemed to be something to watch, often as a communal experience with the whole family encircling a 19-inch black and white Zenith tube TV. Now we have a bazillion channels and web streaming services available on our big screens, desktops, laptops and phones and sometimes it can seem like less is worth watching. Where are the equivalent of Samantha and Jeanie?

To kill tons of time while staving off The Plague, I’ve compiled a list of on-demand and streaming movies that can soak up a whole lot of hours – So here we go. Rankings are between one and five stars.

MOVIES:

Judy (2019) ★★★★★

Renée Zellweger quite literally becomes Judy Garland, albeit Garland towards the end of her sadly too-short short life. Set in 1968 the film mostly focuses on her highly successful last series of concerts in London and all the accumulated challenges, setbacks, depressions, anxieties and neuroses that have all piled up to produce an artist at her breaking point.

Zellweger embodies Garland as did Gary Oldman in his portrayal of Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour (2017, also ★★★★★) to such an extent that she won the Academy Award for Best Actress along with the Golden Globe, BAFTA and Screen Actors Guild trophies for the same category. She swept all major and minor awards across the spectrum and when you see this movie, you’ll know why.

Zellweger’s portrayal of Garland encompasses not just drama but also song – she treats us to a bravura array of Garland hits (Zellweger proved she could sing back when she starred in Chicago (2002 ★★★★) but this level of song mastery goes straight to the ethereal. Her Judy Garland is affecting, touching and haunting and you will be left profoundly moved. There are flashbacks to Judy as a girl and adolescent (played competently by Darci Shaw) but the real action takes place in the late 60s present. The British supporting cast lends gravity and verisimilitude.

This is a must see if you like rock bio heartbreak and redemption stories like Ray (★★★★★), Bohemian Rhapsody (★★★★), Walk The Line (★★★★) and What’s Love Got To Do With It (★★★★★) all of which are highly worthwhile seeing as well.

One Upon A Time in Hollywood ★★★★

Staying in the world of the late 60s, Director Quentin Tarantino brilliantly recreates 1969 LA and Hollywood right down to the smallest paper clip. I’m in love equally with the performances of Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt and Margot Robbie as with DiCaprio’s cream-colored 1966 Cadillac Coupe de Ville. How do I know every detail of Tarantino’s 1969 is correct? Because I was alive and 11 years old at the time.

Brad Pitt, although not having top billing, really anchors the film. Pitt won Best Supporting Actor at the Academy Awards, Golden Globes, BAFTA and Screen Actors Guild. The film itself won Best Picture at the Golden Globes. Pitt made this movie as a 55-year-old and to say on him 55 looks 42 is an understatement. We should all look so good.

This is a bromance between a fast-fading TV star (DiCaprio) and his faithful sidekick and stunt double (Pitt) that echoes the relationship between John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson in Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction (1994 ★★★★★) although with the violence spaced out and themed differently. In the Uma Thurman role is Margot Robbie (Wolf of Wall Street, 2013, also with DiCaprio, ★★★★) playing the late Sharon Tate. “Once Upon A Time” takes the Charles Manson-Sharon Tate Murders in a different direction and with an alternate story line full of twists, turns and surprises.

There are two versions of this film, the full-on version is 2 hours and 41 minutes – (that will chew-up time!) but there is an airplane cut that’s about a half hour shorter which benefits from tighter editing and a quicker pace. Try to rent that one if you can. The only reason this film gets four instead of five stars is because it’s about 20 minutes too long, but I sympathize with the director, what with all these great performances, where can you cut? Any Tarantino film is worth seeing and this latest one is no exception.

Ad Astra ★★★★

Perfect for the “end times” we’re living in, “Ad Astra,” (2019) has the fate of the whole universe in play – all life as we know it is in the balance. Brad Pitt (he had a busy 2019) rockets from 1969 to an unspecified future, perhaps 50 years from now, so about 2069. Pitt plays a heroic astronaut who is tasked with traveling out to Neptune to possibly confront his maybe alive or dead father (played with stoic derangement by Tommy Lee Jones) who headed a space station out at the edge of the solar system where Space Command thinks the cosmic threat is coming from.

The movie also retreads Donald Sutherland as a former friend and colleague of Jones in the quest to stop the threat. “Ad Astra,” Latin for “to the stars,” is evocative of Stanley Kubric’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968 ★★★★★) probably one of the most creative, original and innovative science fiction movies of all time. In “Ad Astra” as with “2001” we are presented with existential ponderings on the of meaning of life and of the nature of life itself. There are plenty of parallels including commercial flights to the moon (on Virgin Atlantic in “Astra” versus the defunct Pan Am in “2001”), vast stretches of uncooperative space and a lot to go over again and again in your mind after viewing the film. Pitt plays a retrained, sardonic space hero in a tight, mature performance. Excellent special effects and cinematography.

Another two lonely astronaut in crisis movies worth seeing are Gravity (2013 ★★★★) starring Sandra Bullock, George Clooney and Ed Harris which won seven Oscars including Best Director for Alfonso Cuarón and The Martian (2015 ★★★★) directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon, also a seven Academy Award-winner which is essentially “Castaway” in space with Damon and Tom Hanks tied for best latter day Robinson Crusoe.

Ford vs. Ferrari ★★★★★

Matt Damon and Christian Bale star as famed performance car guru Carroll Shelby and legendary race car driver Ken Miles respectively in this seemingly “gearhead” movie that women will actually like, believe it or not. As much a car movie as an “accomplish the impossible story against crazy odds and establishment guys in suits” who are always getting in the way of real vision and innovation. As the title suggests this is about Ford Motor Company taking on Ferrari at the Grand Prix of Le Mans back in the mid to late 60s and doing what no one thought was remotely possible, especially in the time they had to do it. The movie keeps you on the edge of your seat and you also feel like you’re a part of the action.

There’s great chemistry between Damon and Bale, two of the best actors of our time, giving highly charismatic performances. The race scenes are probably the best since the original Ben Hur back in the late 50s. “Ford/Ferrari” garnered two Academy Awards along with a bazillion nominations for best everything. 2019 was a highly competitive year and in another time this film would have seen more awards.

If you’d like to see Christian Bale in his first starring role (as good as anything since) rent Empire of The Sun (1987 ★★★★★) Steven Spielberg’s WWII coming-of-age epic set in Japanese-occupied China. John Malkovich and Joe Pantoliano are also great in the film.

Motherless Brooklyn ★★★★

Edward Norton directs, stars and co-wrote the screenplay for this modern Film Noir set in 1950s New York City. Norton plays a private detective with a highly visible case of Tourette's Syndrome, so to say he’s viewed as quirky and totally underestimated by all and sundry persons around him is an understatement. Norton’s character has Tourette’s, but he plays it with tremendous heart and pathos so that you never really feel sorry for him (and certainly don’t laugh at him) but on the contrary with each passing scene come to admire him more and more.

Norton gets all the visuals right about 50s New York, the clothes, cars, streets, dialog. He’s got a great cast backing him up featuring Bruce Willis, Alec Baldwin, Bobby Cannavale and the always terrific Willem Dafoe. It’s a real old-time gumshoe whodunnit and you’ll never guess the end until the end. While “Motherless” wasn’t nominated for any Academy Awards, this was a major omission as it deserves far more recognition.

For a “Bizarro World” Film Noir also featuring Bruce Willis, check out Sin City (2005 ★★★★) directed by Quentin Tarantino along with Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez. The film is based on a graphic novel by Miller and it actually looks like a charcoal or pencil drawing with amplified black and white cinematography with a 50s riff. “Sin” features Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Jessica Alba at her peak (MTV Movie Award Winner), Rosario Dawson, the late Powers Boothe (“Deadwood”), Michael Clarke Duncan and even Rutger Hauer. Winner at the Cannes Film Festival for Best Visuals. Not for the squeamish. Guys and teens will love it.

Finally, for those of you singles cooped-up solo, or those in need of a semi chick-flick, a real apocalyptic romcom would be Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012 ★★★ ½) where Steve Carell and Keira Knightley stumble into one another’s arms as an asteroid heads towards Earth. There’s no real sci-fi in here, but a lot of tenderness, empathy and heart. Carell often plays the emotionally down on his luck dude and this film is no different. Even though oblivion is neigh we’re not afraid because love burns eternal.

The Zeitgeist

Take the Paddles of Life to Your Daily Paper
(Good ideas for weeklies as well)

(This appeared online in December 2019)

With the constant and inexorable decline in print ad dollars and the persistent erosion of circulation and market share, perhaps it's time for daily newspaper publishers to start thinking out of the box and reach for a totally new print paradigm. Print publishing finds itself in a similar place to where radio was with the advent of television. For decades, radio ruled the broadcast roost but couldn’t compete just delivering to the ear what people wanted to see with their eyes. Radio had to reinvent itself, and it did. The reinvention was so good that radio has been and still is a thriving industry even today. Book publishing has survived the onslaught of the tablet and e-reader. We can learn from both experiences what print needs to do to remain competitive along with adapting some new ideas as well. For daily papers in particular, we need to develop a whole new model as opposed to just slashing costs left, right and sideways. Here are some ideas: People like print, they just don't want to pay for it. Give up on the downward sliding paid circulation model and like radio and most of the internet, provide the print edition for free. To maintain audited circulation, move to controlled/requested circulation where readers sign-up that they want it. Deliver via the US Postal Service and stop using the dwindling and often unreliable supply of carriers. Provide some additional free papers via news racks, boxes and at key locations in your market. The focus here is on reach and market share. If your share of the households in your market has declined to 10, 15 or 20 percent then you need to hit the 50 percent threshold to be viable as an advertising medium and relevant editorially. If you're not hovering at least at 50 percent, why should anyone advertise with you? Why would talented young people want to work for you if you're invisible? Even better if you can get to total market coverage of 90 to 100 percent. Reduce publishing frequency -- Unless you're in a seriously major market, stop thinking it's 1979. Reduce publishing frequency to 3X a week (Wednesdays for food, Fridays for the weekend and your Sunday paper). This will have the effect of saving you money on printing, delivery and every other assorted manufacturing cost. Additionally it will force consolidation of existing advertising on your busiest days. Newspapers need to recreate "The Thud Factor," thicker papers make a visual impact and create communal peer pressure to advertise (everyone goes where everyone goes!) and will also give you a more impressive editorial hole making you more of a must read (more about that below)."Thrice weekly, but never weakly." Local, Local, Local. Most folks get their breaking news online, on the radio or TV. Drop all the AP and national and world wire stuff. Put those pages and those resources to work on expanding local and state coverage. Put world and national as a summary or a briefs column if you must have it. Stop trying to compete with electronic media for breaking news. If you run national or world stories it should tie-in to your local market and be heavy on analysis. Add more lifestyles (especially food and restaurants), people, local business and sports coverage. Everyone likes to see themselves in the paper. News about Trump they can get anywhere. Promote evening reading -- Who has time in the morning to sit down with a paper for 20 to 40 minutes? Everyone is dashing off to work, school or other activities. Promote reading after work as a way to calm down and relax from the day, or after dinner or before bed (as a way to help sleep -- screens are known to inhibit sleep, reading things on paper helps it). Perhaps consider becoming and afternoon/evening paper even. But if you are keeping it local and heavy on features or sports, it won't matter when you deliver so long as it's before 5pm. The cable news networks all have higher ratings at night than in the morning or during the day. Newspapers should emulate this. Drop your ad rates -- See what Google and Facebook are charging locally. What are the rates for a local radio, cable or broadcast TV campaign? Make sure your rates are lower than everyone else so that it's a no-risk, no-brainier for people to include you in their media buys. Go for volume (think McDonald's) instead of a few ads a day. Offer even more discounts for multiple pages or inserts. Bonus web ads free for print contracts. Offer free (yes, I said that) classifieds for consumers to promote more readership and regain market share. Heavily discount business classifieds. Oh, and make sure your display ads LOOK GOOD and are written well (Design2Pro’s “Ad Factory” can help you in the looks department) so when the advertiser looks good, ads get more readership and more response. This leads to happier advertisers who'll spend more money with you. At the end of the day it's about image, exposure and results for the advertiser and more revenue for you.

This is no time for newspaper publishers to walk around sulking, complacent or resigned to defeat. People are still reading a lot of printed books -- because the books have content not available elsewhere (again, drop the national and world wire coverage, increase original content) and because people have screen fatigue. I work at a computer or smart phone screen all day. By 5 or 6pm my eyes have absolutely had it. It's comforting to read from paper after staring at screens all day. One final thought -- remember as kids your mother would warn you not to "sit on top of the TV because you'll go blind?” Well, that's what most of us are doing every day, sitting on top of the screen. Promote the idea of R&R for the eyes and peace of mind that comes from the printed word. If book publishers can do it, so can you.