Tonight! June 11, 2020June 12, 2020 Got $1,000 to save the world? Come zoom with Jay Leno, Barbra Streisand, John Legend, Rob Reiner, Jennifer Hudson, Andra Day — the next President and First Lady of the United States — and a dozen more. Tonight. Join us! Nick Kristof: wise words on smart ways to “defund the police.” E.g., decriminalize drugs, as Portugal did, and send social workers instead of armed cops. CNF — A research firm called Greenridge Global has initiated coverage of this Chinese mortgage lender some of us have invested in OWMWCTATL. Based on a multiple of 8X their estimated 2021 earnings, they’ve set a target of $5.50 for the stock. Based on a multiple of 16X my wildlyguesstimated 2024 earnings, I’m hoping to sell at around $20 someday. A reminder: OWMWCTATL stands for “only with money we can truly afford to lose.” PRKR — yesterday’s note went out to those of you who get this by email before I added a couple of “albeits.” Barr is the worst Attorney General ever. It goes back to his bullying days in Pforzheimer hall — where I will admit some of us eighth graders used to launch our book bags down the smooth hallway like bowling balls, hoping to knock over a seventh grader. But then, as we advanced toward adulthood, some of us grew less evil. Pompeo is the worst Secretary of State ever. Just one of dozens of big stories, like Trump’s sustained attack on the environment . . . and smaller ones, like his kick in the teeth to veterans* . . . that would ordinarily have made it onto the national radar. Let’s get rid of these people. Join us tonight! *”Veterans groups . . . had implored Trump to stand with members of the military who they say are routinely preyed upon by unscrupulous schools for their lucrative GI Bill education benefits.”
From Chechnya To Chiquita June 10, 2020June 11, 2020 I love this: This city disbanded its police department 7 years ago. Here’s what happened next. (Thanks, Tym.) . . . Now, seven years after the old department was booted (though around 100 officers were rehired), the city’s crime has dropped by close to half. Officers host outdoor parties for residents and knock on doors to introduce themselves. It’s a radically different Camden than it was even a decade ago. Here’s how they did it. . . . I hate this: What Chechnya is doing to its LGBT sons and daughters . . . with the full support of Vladimir Putin. Watch it June 30 on HBO . . . or online as part of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival anytime between June 11-June 20 once you chip in $9 and sign up. The film is called “Welcome to Chechnya.” Something happens near the end that’s so brave it made me cry. Those of you who’ve joined me in gambling on PRKR — with money you can truly afford to lose — may be heartened by this analysis. Albeit not entirely independent (on the last page, it discloses it was paid for). And based on 59 million shares outstanding, which is probably half the number of fully-diluted shares by the time they get their huge settlement (if ever). But even so, the upside seems real. Finally, as promised yesterday — from a guy (me!) who delights in eating expired food — this helpful video on making even fresh food, like bananas, last longer: https://andrewtobias.com/wp-content/uploads/keep-food-fresh.mp4
The Article Everybody’s Talking About June 9, 2020 Well, maybe not everybody . . . but have you read it? History Will Judge The Complicit by Anne Applebaum in The Atlantic. . . . Since the Second World War, historians and political scientists have tried to explain why some people in extreme circumstances become collaborators and others do not. . . . Hoffmann observed that many of those who became ideological collaborators were . . . people who perceived themselves as part of a natural ruling class that had been unfairly deprived of power under the left-wing governments of France in the 1930s. Equally motivated to collaborate were their polar opposites, the “social misfits and political deviants” who would, in the normal course of events, never have made successful careers of any kind. What brought these groups together was a common conclusion that, whatever they had thought about Germany before June 1940, their political and personal futures would now be improved by aligning themselves with the occupiers. . . . It’s long, fascinating, highly relevant, and important, so let me get out of the way and leave you to it. Tomorrow: a trick for keeping bananas fresh.
Unemployment Did NOT Plunge In May June 8, 2020June 7, 2020 Here’s why. . . . Part of it involves how the BLS treats the many millions of people now on furlough and not being paid. They are considered “unemployed on temporary layoff.” But if BLS expects them to return to their old jobs, based on the survey, they do not count among the unemployed. . . . And there are more parts to it. Of course, once the virus is no longer a threat, or ways are found to get people safely back to work even while it is (or ways are not found but they have to go back anyway), the unemployment will fall. It will be hard to see that as a great achievement, though, it having left us trillions of dollars deeper in debt as a nation . . . with so many families and businesses having depleted their savings or themselves gone deeper in debt . . . and with so many kids stunted in their educations . . . and, of course, with so many tens of thousands of deaths that could have been averted. Andrew R.: “In Idaho, militias are openly on patrol to keep out Antifa, which wasn’t coming. It reminds me of the guy on a park bench scattering torn newspapers around it. Asked why, he said it was to keep away the elephants. Told there were no elephants in the area, he says ‘See? It works.'” Stephen P: “It’s like a scene out of the old movie, The Russians are Coming! The Russians are Coming!” → Except now, of course, after a fashion, they are. Putin is succeeding beyond his wildest dreams. Meanwhile — to make your Monday so dark Tuesday can only get better — Meet The Hidden Architect Behind America’s Racist Economic System. I had never heard of him. Arguably, though no longer living, he’s had an enormous impact on our lives — and it’s not over.
Quick Takes June 5, 2020June 5, 2020 Trump in 30 seconds: This is an awful man, waving a book he hasn’t read, in front of a church he doesn’t attend, invoking laws he doesn’t understand, against fellow Americans he sees as enemies, wielding a military he dodged serving, to protect power he gained via accepting foreign interference, exploiting fear and anger he loves to stoke, after failing to address a pandemic he was warned about, and building it all on a bed of constant lies and childish inanity. — Robert Hendrickson, Rector at St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, Tucson, Arizona God weighs in — don’t 30 seconds. Trump’s followers are losing faith. From March to May, his job approval among evangelicals dropped from nearly 77% to 62%, according to a new poll. Catholics, too. And this before he cleared Lafayette Park for his walk to the church to annoy God. (See clip above.) A “model minority” member (i.e., Asian) weighs in on the injustice to black Americans — 60 blisteringly quick seconds. A possible Valley Girl weighs in on “all lives matter.” I love this one. Emanuel Acho offers this really thoughtful guide to white folks with questions. Following up on Wednesday . . . another Republican voice I agree with. George Will: Trump must be removed. So must his congressional enablers. Are Ellen DeGeneres and Anderson Cooper destroying America? Reports Propublica: Merritt Corrigan, USAID’s new deputy White House liaison, has condemned the “tyrannical LGBT agenda” and celebrated Hungary’s right-wing prime minister as “the shining champion of Western civilization.” Happy Pride, y’all! Have a great weekend. BONUS 50 seconds: https://andrewtobias.com/wp-content/uploads/playground-trump.mp4
A Democratic Voice I Agree With June 4, 2020June 3, 2020 Take the time to imagine calm, competent, honorable leadership. Leadership that inspires the better angels of our nature, on both sides of the aisle. And that populates the administration with calm, competent, dedicated public servants. I yield the balance of my time to the next president of the United States.
Republican Voices I Agree With June 3, 2020June 2, 2020 One hundred ordinary Republicans, most of whom voted for Trump. One now says: “I’d vote for a tuna fish sandwich before I’d vote for Donald Trump again.” Another: “I’m a registered Republican. I’ve never voted for a Democrat before in my life. But I will be in 2020.” Watch a few of their stories. Not among those 100: our own Tom and Carl, both smart and well-meaning, who’ve gotten caught up in the cult. They know Trump to be an honest, decent man — not a racist bone in his body — who’s done more than anyone else could have done to protect us from the pandemic. Indeed, he knew it was a pandemic long before most people (that big brain), which is why he had a head start and has done such a great job. They see how he’s united the country, reduced our deficits, gotten North Korea to denuclearize, and won easy trade wars to the great benefit of our farmers. And he did all this having inherited a virtual depression from Obama, who should be locked up along with Hillary. Anything to the contrary, they believe — like climate science — is fake. Help! Putin is winning winning winning, as the world begins to pity us. (America the ‘pitiful’: Irish author explains the ‘suspension of disbelief’ that made Trump’s destruction of America possible.) Do you think his thousands of psy-op agents are helping divide us further? This example of misinformation is apparently home-grown, and amplified to 2.8 million followers by Donald Trump, Jr. — White supremacists pose as Antifa online, call for violence. But how many other tweets and posts and memes get lobbed in from St. Petersburg? Help! Help! 60-SECOND BONUS The latest ad from the Republican-led, Republican-funded Lincoln Project. 30-SECOND BONUS How Old Guys Exercise: https://andrewtobias.com/wp-content/uploads/HOW-OLD-GUYS-STAY-IN-SHAPE1.mp4
Zantzinger Was Awful; Chauvin Worse June 2, 2020 Reading Barack Obama on the protests, and what you can do, it’s hard not to imagine how much better he and Vice President Biden would have handled the pandemic than Trump and Pence. And thus the economy as well. The 4.7% unemployment Obama/Biden left us with — wrestled down from 10% at the trough of Bush’s Great Recession — would have likely just kept falling without piling on trillions in tax cuts for the rich. Instead, we have Trump’s Great Recession. It’s hard not to imagine how much better they would have handled China. Their painstakingly negotiated 11-nation TransPacific Partnership would have had us crafting the rules of the road, not China. (Bonus: it wouldn’t have decimated America’s farmers.) And health care: mending, not ending, it. And climate. And honesty and ethics and, yes, race relations. Watch Houston police chief Acevedo’s message to Trump on that score. Head Butler Jesse Kornbluth turned me on to the lyrics to Dylan’s The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll. I knew the song (just as I knew Lady Gaga’s Poker Face), but I had never been able to make out the lyrics (for years I heard “cherry pie” where she was singing “can’t read my”). Dylan’s lyrics are timely and chilling. I found myself wondering just how true to history they were, and found the real story. (Also: what happened next.) Still chilling, still damning — but not as bad as last week’s crime in Minneapolis. Unlike William Zantzinger, Derek Chauvin was not drunk when he killed George Floyd — he was sober. He was not some spoiled rich kid — he was an officer of the law. The harm he inflicted was delivered not impulsively, in a momentary burst — but with plenty of time for reflection over eight minutes and forty-six seconds. It was not condoned by three other officers of the law — just a lone, really awful — non-lethal — whack. And it was 1963. We’re supposed to have come a long way since then — and have. But, as is so painfully obvious, not nearly far enough. Is This the Worst Year in Modern American History? asks Jim Fallows in the Atlantic. Comparing 2020 to 1968 offers some disquieting lessons for the present. Read Barack Obama. Watch Chief Acevedo.
Listen To Bobby. Listen To Trevor. June 1, 2020May 31, 2020 I was driving on a dark road April 4, 1968, when Bobby Kennedy came on the radio saying Martin Luther King, Jr., had been killed. I’m sure you know that speech. We’ve come a long way since then but have so far still to go. “If you have 12 bad cops and 1,300 good ones who don’t turn the bad ones in, you have 1,312 bad cops.” — Unattributed “What did you expect? I don’t know why we’re so surprised [by the riots]. When you put your foot on a man’s neck and hold him down for three hundred years . . . ” — Lyndon Johnson I’m An Angry Black Woman. This Is What I Want White People To Know. “If you’re thinking, ‘I’m not racist, I’m not prejudiced, I’m not biased.’ You are. On some spectrum. And here is how I know.” . . . Racism exists because white colonists decided hundreds of years ago to dominate a land full of native people who were minding their own business and then to kidnap people from another continent to labor mercilessly without compensation for their economic gain. And every turn of events since, every snippet of progress thereafter, has been twisted to maintain the economic and social hierarchy that existed the day America became America. . . . Better still, listen to Trevor Noah (successor to Jon Stewart as host of “The Daily Show”). . . . How many George Floyds are there that don’t die? How many men are having knees put on their necks? How many Sandra Blands are out there being tossed around?” asked Noah. “It doesn’t make the news because it’s not grim enough. It doesn’t even get us anymore. It’s only the deaths, the gruesome deaths, that stick out. But imagine to yourself if you grew up in a community where every day someone had their knee on your neck? If every day someone was out there oppressing you, every single day, you tell me what that does to you as a society, as a community, as a group of people and when you know it’s happening because of the color of your skin. . . . “What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.” — Bobby Kennedy Like these Ferguson police taking a knee in honor of George Floyd and these Camden police marching in solidarity with the protesters. Listen to Trevor.