New York Times

I picked up a reporter’s notebook, handed it to him, and told him to bring a pen. Bob’s idea of showing emotion was to smile slightly, showing the well-­stimulated incisors. He didn’t smile. No doubt he thought, the kid’s acting up again, but . . . it’s his last day, and it was. I was thirty-­one and had been a reporter at the Times for four years, but I was leaving to go to Yale Law School. Except I’d just gotten a scoop and I couldn’t walk away from it.

There will be time for an outbreak postmortem once the U.S. gets past the threat of the coronavirus  --  and the nation will move past it, just as it has countless challenges in the past. The question now is how many Americans will suffer and how many will die unnecessarily. Our goal should be to protect as many fellow citizens as possible, regardless of political affiliation, race, age, gender, etc. Viruses neither care about nor recognize these traits, nor should we when addressing a crisis. Unfortunately, our efforts to safeguard the populace have been seriously undermined by the current social and political climate, rife with division and prejudice, and this climate has been not only fostered, but furthered, by the current administration.

With so many critically acclaimed films out this winter—and a stacked awards season—it’s easy to make the argument for a new Golden Age of cinema: this season, American Hustle, Wolf of Wall Street, Twelve Years a Slave and more films were garnering buzz for their nominations and reviews. Is this the sign of a new boom for cinema? Or does saying the art of film is back a self-fulfilling prophecy? American Hustle was a front-runner this award season and was initially met with fairly consistent acclaim, but with its 10 Oscar nominations, American Hustle left viewers empty-handed. 

Diversity has always been—and for a number of reasons still is—the china-crashing elephant in the room that few really want to talk about or address. Lack of black people in the mainstream newsroom is an ongoing phenomenon that most—if not all—outlets seem unwilling to fix. Even worse is the lack of black leadership in the newsroom. But the fact remains that most demographic segments, regardless of background, still rush to bigged-up brand-name institutions as their most reliable sources for news. That won’t and shouldn’t change if you’re a rapacious consumer of information. As a result, people of color should hold these vaunted publications’ collective feet to the fire.



 

Last year, the Pew Research Center for the Internet and American Life announced that for the first time a majority of seniors (53 percent) use e-mail or the Internet. But a previous Pew survey revealed that most of the older set doesn’t get news from any online source. The study found that only four in 10 members of those 65-74 ever go online for news, and merely one in six members of the “Greatest Generation” (75 and over) do so.

The Yes Men revolt against the status quo of corporate antipathy and civilian complacency with Swiftian public displays. In their traditional approach, Andy and Mike portray themselves as corporate executives and deliver presentations, awards or speeches that satirically out the inhuman nature of the company they purport to represent (think Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal using modern modes of dissemination).  If the fate of the world is played on a corporate stage, the Yes Men are playing the role of the fool.

In a September 12-16 poll Romney trailed Obama by eight points among likely voters. In a post-debate poll, Obama lags four percentage points behind Romney. What's sent the likes of Andrew Sullivan into an even greater hysterical frenzy is the fact that Romney has erased Obama's gender advantage. Women are evenly divided (47 percent) between the two. Last month Obama had an 18 point lead over Romney among women. Reuters found Romney and Obama tied at 45 percent each among likely voters. Obama still leads by five points among registered voters in Gallup's latest tracking poll, which averages seven days of data.

So many of us now have been raised on video games, cell phones and iPods. We’ve spent a large bulk of our lives in chat rooms, on Skype and posting videos to YouTube, to the extent that we’ve become news reporters and newsmakers, without even making much of an effort. We announce our actions and, in some cases, our impending demise online without giving it much thought. We have been so conditioned to invest our emotional life in the virtual space that it has become second nature.