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The public health case for decarcerating America’s prison system

Politicians in the United States have chosen for decades to spend trillions of dollars to manage poverty, addiction, and homelessness via policing and prisons. As a result, around 20 percent of the world’s incarcerated people are held in one of the world’s wealthiest nations — despite it containing less than 5 percent of the global population. And as millions of people have been forcibly cycled through America’s punishment system over the years, it has etched deep harms into their bodies, psyches, and social lives — harms that continue to haunt them long after they have been released from custody.

The harms of incarceration include economic costs, long-term housing and employment disadvantages, social injury, psychological trauma from rampant human rights abuses, and chronic health care neglect. One measure of the collective impact of these harms is life expectancy: A study of parolees in New York estimated that, on average, incarcerated people were deprived of two years of life expectancy for each year they were locked up; another estimated that a 45-year-old who has been incarcerated in the U.S. can expect to live four to five years less than they would have had they never been imprisoned.

But numbers like these only scratch the surface of the damage incarceration leaves in its wide-rippling wake. That’s because biomedical and social conditions are always intertwined, which means that they implicate not just individuals but communities. As a result, harms inflicted on incarcerated individuals undermine the health and safety of their families, neighborhoods, counties, and, ultimately, the whole country. America’s mass incarceration problem is a massive public health threat to us all.

Millions of families who have endured the incarceration of a loved one are already intimately acquainted with this fact. Recent research found that siblings, children, and parents of the incarcerated themselves lose 2.6 years of life expectancy relative to peers who have not had family members taken away by the American legal system. Notably, these human costs fall heaviest on communities of color, especially Black communities, whose ongoing systematic legal and economic oppression effectively amounts to a race tax, paid not just in dollars but also in years of life.

But in a country where there are as many people who live with criminal records as there are people with college degrees, the harms of incarceration don’t stop at the family; neither do they stop with overpoliced communities of color. Recently, public health researchers have begun using the tools of epidemiology and econometrics to trace the ways carceral injury spreads to the general public, and to document the extent of its reach. Two important studies published in the last year, for example, show that higher incarceration rates drive significant increases in community-wide mortality –– due to causes including infectious disease, chronic lower respiratory disease, overdose, heart disease, diabetes, and suicide.

This is because, as carceral-community epidemiology makes clear, incarcerated people are always in biosocial interrelation with outside communities, such that correctional health and community health cannot be effectively studied or addressed in isolation from one another. The consequences of abusive conditions in jails and prisons therefore inevitably boomerang back to harm the rest of society. So, for example, when incarcerated people are subjected to overcrowding and neglect that foster the rapid spread of infectious diseases, jails and prisons are made into epidemic engines that multiply and spread sickness and death throughout broader communities.

The Covid-19 pandemic has put this reality of carceral-community epidemiology into stark relief. Several of the earliest Covid-19 outbreaks in the world occurred in Chinese prisons. By the end of February 2020, Wuhan prisons, for example, contained nearly half of the city’s known Covid-19 cases. Soon thereafter, outbreaks began appearing in jails and prisons worldwide. Public health experts sounded alarms that the world’s largest system of incarceration — America’s — posed a major threat to public health and global biosecurity. Unfortunately, U.S. public health officials and policymakers responded by mostly turning a blind eye.

As a consequence, in March 2020, one of the biggest outbreaks in the U.S. began at Cook County Jail in Chicago. Within weeks, nearly 16 percent of the thousands of community cases statewide in Illinois were attributable to spread from the jail, according to analyses conducted by a colleague and myself. By April 2021, 661,000 cases of Covid-19 had been documented inside U.S. jails and prisons. Today, due to data obstruction by prison administrators and dysfunctional reporting systems, no one knows for sure how many people have become sick or have died inside these institutions. But one thing is certain: However many infections and deaths there have been on the inside, carceral facilities have given rise to many times more on the outside. Millions of cases and tens of thousands of Covid-19 deaths across the U.S. have been driven by outbreaks that spread from jails and prisons into surrounding communities.

This carceral boomerang effect is not new. Long before Covid-19, it had been observed in relation to HIV, tuberculosis, hepatitis C, influenza, and other infectious diseases. My colleagues saw it during prison-driven tuberculosis epidemics in post-Soviet Russia, after a substantial increase of the Russian incarceration rate in the 1990s helped fuel an explosion of drug-resistant tuberculosis across Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Studies have also repeatedly demonstrated links between incarceration rates and community-wide tuberculosis outbreaks in Brazil. And a 2020 study in Paraguay warned that higher incarceration rates were fueling TB spread within prisons that, in turn, threatened wider public health and jeopardized the nation’s tuberculosis control system.

By incubating and spreading disease, mass incarceration has long undermined public health for everyone. What’s new with Covid-19, then, is not how incarceration is harming us but rather the enormous scale and rapid pace at which it is doing so. And despite claims by politicians who seek to avoid responsibility for inaction, none of this was unforeseen.

Fortunately, as the more infectious omicron variant intensifies an ongoing pandemic, there is an immediately accessible solution to the flood of disease spread by mass incarceration: Release the hundreds of thousands of individuals who evidence shows pose no threat to public safety. Their continued confinement clearly makes no one safer.

If President Joe Biden, Attorney General Merrick Garland, the U.S. Congress, state governors, mayors, judges, sheriffs, and prison administrators find the courage to fulfill their duty to protect the public, thousands of needless deaths can still be prevented. Collectively, these officials have a vast array of policy options at their disposal, including executive orders; commutations; expanded use of clemency; federal, state, and local court orders that can release thousands of people; and changes to policing policies that can stop senseless arrests for low-level alleged crimes. Officials — from the local to the federal level — must stop feigning helplessness and use the levers of power available to them.

But the American public cannot wait on politicians who have — on a bipartisan basis — repeatedly exploited the politics of “crime paranoia,” insisted on pointless punishment, and prioritized political points over constituents’ lives. To confront our national carceral problem, we will need to build broad coalitions of activists, criminalized communities, labor unions, prison and jail staff, public defenders and prosecutors, public health and health care workers, and millions of formerly and currently incarcerated people. We must collectively force lawmakers to reject tepid incrementalism and to embrace bold steps to end mass punishment. These steps must include large-scale decarceration coupled with investments in systems for successful reentry, such as guaranteed housing, health care, and basic income, as a basic matter of both ethics and public health.

The abolition of America’s incarceration system –– and its replacement with infrastructures of support that are far more effective at preventing violence –– must be a centerpiece of sustained efforts to rebuild U.S. public health and global pandemic preparedness. Rather than spend some $200 billion each year on policing and punishment that inflict harm on the entire country, America’s lawmakers must redirect public investments towards building the systems of equality, economic security, and care required to ensure genuine public safety for everyone.

Eric Reinhart is an anthropologist of policing, prisons, and public health, a psychoanalyst, and resident physician at Northwestern University. He is also a lead researcher in the Data and Evidence for Justice Reform program at The World Bank Research Group. The views expressed in this article are the author’s alone and do not reflect those of The World Bank. @_Eric_Reinhart

This article was originally published on Undark. Read the original article.

I can’t stop buying N95 masks: As a hoarder, my instinct is to shop my way out of the pandemic

Logically, I know I can’t shop my way out of the COVID-19 pandemic, but that hasn’t stopped me from trying. As I write this, it’s close to 2 a.m. and I just spent $186 on N95 masks from nonprofit organization Project N95 for myself and my partner. That’s on top of the $25 I spent on masks last week from a different site, which have yet to arrive. 

After reading multiple articles on the need for mask upgrades, I also ordered them for each of my parents and am resisting the urge to check on each of my family’s members masking practices and send a shipment to anyone who hasn’t upgraded yet. Recognizing the financial privilege I have to be able to afford so many masks, I also donated $180, a multiple of 18, which stands for chai (“life” in Hebrew), to Project N95 to further their mission to help people “stay safe through the COVID-19 pandemic by providing equitable access to the resources they need.”

As a hoarder, being prepared for any and every eventuality is so deeply ingrained in me, I sometimes don’t even recognize the tendency. It’s second nature to me to want to stockpile whatever I can, whether it’s food or toilet paper or, now, masks that I hope will stave off the omicron variant that’s breaking records in the United States.

RELATED: Thanks, Marie Kondo: How fear of disorder nearly ended my marriage

This morning, after yet another friend told me they’d tested positive, I half-joked to my partner that it would likely be a daily occurrence; the joke stopped being funny when I received further similar messages by the end of the day.

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For me, one of the most challenging aspects of this pandemic, which has now lasted so long I can’t envision a future without it, is the feeling of helplessness. My partner and I were lucky enough to be able to work from home and afford grocery delivery last year. I too watched in horror as the death toll rose, but I felt relatively protected in terms of my own personal safety. That is, until 2021 rolled around and I had to spend six hours in the emergency room in January, pre-vaccination, with blood gushing out of my vagina during a miscarriage for a pregnancy I didn’t even know I was carrying.

That day, I wore two face masks and a face shield, and I was certainly grateful I’d stocked up on them “just in case.” Thus far, I’ve managed to escape the tentacles of COVID-19, but as more people around me test positive, as appointments start being canceled for what are clearly outbreaks — like when I was told the day before a banking appointment that the bank’s sole banker would be unavailable for 10 days — it’s starting to seem inevitable that I will find myself sending news about my positive test results soon too, raising New Jersey’s numbers by one, or two if I infect my partner.

I’d like to think I’m a rational person, and I’m well aware that no matter how much I do “right,” this virus doesn’t really care. Unless I literally never leave my home or interact with anyone else, I’m still susceptible. I’ve tried to embrace that reality without too much of a pessimistic, doomsday outlook. One way that I take care of my mental health is to try to wrest a semblance of control out of uncontrollable situations, my personal way of performing the only prayer I truly believe in, Reinhold Niebuhr’s Serenity Prayer. I see that prayer as less about asking an abstract deity for help as about imbuing myself with the power to help myself while recognizing my own powerlessness.

There’s a very tricky tension to holding that oft-quoted serenity, courage and wisdom together amidst the daunting, damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don’t decisions this pandemic requires. Is buying more masks really keeping me safe? Should I have had my boyfriend drive me half an hour away to Walmart, a business I’d vowed to myself never to shop from, to purchase six boxes of at-home COVID-19 tests the night before we drove to visit his family so everyone could test ahead of our gathering and I’d have some left over for future trips? Where does my personal responsibility to protect myself and those around me end and my responsibility to share resources begin?

I don’t have the answers to those questions, and on most recent days I’ve found it hard to answer even basic queries about how to spend my time. Should I skip my Sunday trips to our quirky grocery store where the weekly specials often yield delightful yet utterly random seasonal food offerings? Should I keep my early January plans to fly to visit my father, whom I haven’t seen in almost two years? Should I entertain the notion of going to Europe in the spring to visit my new baby cousin, who looks more and more adorable in each photo? Should I try to get out of any in-person professional commitments and return to working from home, even though I’m sure that would cause my mental health to plummet?

Decision fatigue coupled with middle-aged insomnia topped with alarmist posts from people I probably should stop following on social media has led me to cry myself to sleep, or wake up crying, more and more often the past few weeks. The joys of life as an introverted homebody have started to fade with every choice I’m faced with making. I was a jigsaw puzzle fiend last year, turning to them in every spare moment. Now I often cross my living room, see a half-done puzzle, and instead park myself on my couch, zone out and mindlessly scroll and scroll and scroll on my phone.

This brings me back to those masks I just ordered. Do I need dozens of N95 masks, especially if I’m going to curtail my trips outside the house? Probably not. But I want to have them in case I or anyone I know needs them now or in the future. With supply chain issues having affected almost every major consumer product, I don’t know how long they’ll be so readily available. 

It may seem like mere consumerism, but I consider that impulsive but cathartic mask purchase an act of courage in the face of an endless sea of unknowns. I may still struggle with accepting the things I cannot change, and I’m not well versed enough in science to say whether wearing the masks will change my chances of testing positive, but the purchase feels victorious nonetheless, one small proactive step amidst endless opportunities for waffling. Now I just have to decide when and where I’ll be wearing them—but I’ll save that for another day.

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New year, new chicken and noodle casserole? Revamping the Midwestern staple

Memories are funny things. There was a neighborhood kid with whom I played when I lived in the Chicago suburbs. I can’t remember her name for the life of me, but I do remember her dog’s name (he was a chocolate lab named Caesar) and her mom’s chicken and noodle casserole. 

Looking back, it was likely one of those recipes that came printed on the back of a Campbell’s cream-of-whatever can (and thus called for a can or two of soup as a base). From there, it included all the requisite old-school casserole ingredients: pliable egg noodles, a bag of frozen vegetables, shredded cheddar cheese, milk and (in this case) a Ritz cracker topping. 

RELATED: Trying to recreate Hamburger Helper was the best thing for my cooking in 2021

To eight-year-old me, it was a kaleidoscopic explosion of comfort — buttery, carb-filled, cheesy and creamy. The beige-on-beige bites were dotted with the occasional errant pea or minced piece of carrot. God bless my own mother, an insanely talented cook who relishes in using fresh ingredients but eventually indulged my request to make something that was almost anathematic to her own style of cooking. It was equally good; while it didn’t stay in the weekly rotation, the memory of it lingered. 

I’m not sure if it’s cooking fatigue or simply the start of a new year, but I’ve recently been on a bit of a nostalgia trip when it comes to making dinner. I’ve chronicled my monthslong process to create a copycat Hamburger Helper, and I’m currently fiddling with an orzo and mini-meatball recipe that has shades of Spaghetti-O’s. 

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Earlier this week, as the forecast called for snow and below-freezing windchill, I began to reminisce about that chicken and noodle casserole. I decided to take the elements I loved about it the most and develop a version that was more in line with how I cook at home today. Let’s break it down piece by piece: 

Cream of mushroom soup 

I’m not at all opposed to cooking from cans, but some creamy soup bases take on a tinny flavor (and, frankly, kind of a gloppy texture) after being canned. You can definitely do better at home. We’ll start by sautéing fresh garlic, mushrooms, onion and some spices in a knob or two of butter and then folding that mixture into a luxurious béchamel sauce.  

Chicken 

Shred some rotisserie chicken. It’s just as convenient as the tinned variety, but it tastes a whole lot fresher. 

Noodles 

Alright, I’ll admit that I initially got too cute with this step. I created a chicken, mushroom, ricotta and white cheddar filling, which I stuffed into manicotti. I covered them in béchamel, more cheese and a crispy-crumb topping. It was delicious, but — and this is said in my best Carrie Bradshaw voice — I had to wonder when does a casserole stop being a casserole? I didn’t come up with a concrete answer, but this definitely felt a little too far afield. 

I reigned it in, and after experimenting with radiatori and wagon wheels, I settled on rigatoni. They’re readily available and stand up to time in the oven a little bit better than the standard egg noodle. 

Vegetables 

Go with the classic peas and carrots combo! Though frozen is great here, you can definitely get fresh. (If you go this route, be sure to mince the carrot finely. You can do this using a food processor.)

Cheese 

Again, it was easy to go overboard here. I tried a nutty gruyère and pecorino, but I eventually found my way back to a good old cheddar and a tablespoon of grated parmesan. I’m partial to white cheddar, but yellow is just fine, too. 

Topping 

We’re going with a double-whammy of crispiness for the topping by mixing fried shallots and toasted, buttery panko breadcrumbs. 

***

Recipe: Homemade Chicken and Noodle Casserole 

Serves 8

Ingredients  

  • 16 ounces of rigatoni, cooked according to the instructions on the box 
  • 4 cups of shredded rotisserie chicken
  • 4 tablespoons of butter, divided
  • 2 tablespoons of flour 
  • 1 cup of baby bella mushrooms, roughly chopped
  • 1/2 small white onion, minced
  • 3 cloves of garlic, minced 
  • 2 teaspoons of dried thyme 
  • 2 teaspoons of oregano 
  • 1/4 cup of heavy cream 
  • 2 cups of chicken stock 
  • 1 tablespoon of grated parmesan cheese
  • 2 cups of mixed frozen carrots and peas
  • 1 cup of shredded white cheddar cheese
  • 1/4 cup of fried shallots 
  • 3/4 cup of panko breadcrumbs 
  • Parsley for garnish 
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Directions 

1. In a large pot, melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Add the garlic, mushrooms and onion. Season with salt and pepper and sauté until the mixture begins to brown and become fragrant, about 8 minutes. Remove the mushroom mixture and set aside. 

2. Add 2 more tablespoons of butter to the pot, and after it has melted, whisk in the flour. Once the mixture forms a thick, cohesive paste, continue to stir until it takes on a toasty color. While continuing to whisk, add the dried thyme, oregano, heavy cream and chicken stock. The mixture should become thick and velvety. 

3. Add the grated parmesan cheese to the sauce and allow it to simmer, stirring occasionally, until it has reduced and thickened slightly, about 5 minutes. 

4. Fold in the frozen carrots and peas, rotisserie chicken and mushroom mixture, followed by the pasta. Once it has all combined, add in the cup of white cheddar cheese. 

5. Transfer the casserole filling to a prepared baking dish and set aside. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. 

6. While the oven is heating, sauté your panko breadcrumbs in the remaining tablespoon of butter until browned. Season with salt and pepper and toss with the fried shallots. Sprinkle this topping over the casserole. 

7. Bake the casserole for 35 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to stand for 5 minutes before garnishing with chopped fresh parsley.

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Joe Manchin apparently no longer supports his own Build Back Better counteroffer

U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin came under fire Saturday after The Washington Post reported that the West Virginia Democrat “does not currently support” passing even his own recent $1.8 trillion counteroffer to President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda.

“Sen. Manchin is operating in bad faith,” tweeted Nida Allam, a progressive congressional candidate in North Carolina. “We need to be electing Democrats who are accountable to the American people and working families—not Dems who are reneging on deals which would support millions.”

Journalist Judd Legum, who runs the newsletter Popular Information, said that “if you were a fossil fuel lobbyist and had to construct an ideal strategy not only to kill BBB but to gum up the works for as long as possible it would look a lot like what Manchin has been doing.”

In a secretly recorded conversation published last summer by Unearthed, Greenpeace U.K.’s investigative journalism arm, a lobbyist for fossil fuel giant ExxonMobil said of Manchin, “I talk to his office every week.”

Since then, House Democrats have passed a watered-down version of the Build Back Better package. However, progressives within and beyond Congress have grown increasingly alarmed about the bill’s future, especially after the lower chamber caved to a few members of their own party and decoupled it from bipartisan infrastructure legislation.

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Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), one of the six progressives to oppose the decoupling, warned at the time that “passing the infrastructure bill without passing the Build Back Better Act first risks leaving behind child care, paid leave, healthcare, climate action, housing, education, and a roadmap to citizenship.”

Noting the new reporting, former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner said Saturday that “the Squad was right to not trust Joe Manchin.”

Manchin—who, along with Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.), has long held up a vote on the Build Back Better Act in the upper chamber—confirmed Tuesday that he is not currently talking with the White House about the package, telling reporters that “there is no negotiation going on at this time.”

Citing three unnamed sources, the Post‘s Jeff Stein revealed that “privately, he has also made clear that he is not interested in approving legislation resembling Biden’s Build Back Better package and that Democrats should fundamentally rethink their approach.”

RELATED: Corporate donations flowed into Joe Manchin’s PAC ahead of final “No” on BBB

“Senior Democrats say they do not believe Manchin would support his offer even if the White House tried adopting it in full—at least not at the moment—following the fallout in mid-December,” Stein continued, referencing a pair of White House statements that called out the senator by name and a Fox News appearance in which Manchin blasted the bill.

In response to Stein’s revelation that Manchin’s offer “may no longer be on the table,” Jake Sherman of Punchbowl News tweeted that “it’s definitely not.”

“As of now, I have no reporting that Manchin will get back up to [$1.8 trillion]. I talk to him nearly every day and he continues to be exceedingly skeptical of anything,” Sherman said. “Now, could something happen? Sure. Could it happen at [$1.8 trillion]? Maybe. Is that likely today? It doesn’t seem so.”

Along with cutting the expanded child tax credit, “Manchin’s offer included no funding for housing and no funding for racial equity initiatives,” according to the Post. His proposal also retained tax increases opposed by Sinema, and though it featured “substantial new climate funds, the underlying policy details of his proposed climate provisions remain unclear and could have proved difficult for the White House to ultimately accept.”

Getting the Build Back Better Act through the Senate requires support from every single member of the Democratic caucus. Though they can use the budget reconciliation process for that package, other bills are being blocked by the legislative filibuster—which Democrats could abolish with majority support, but Manchin and Sinema oppose doing so.

With the Build Back Better agenda stalled, Senate Democrats have shifted their focus to voting rights legislation. While Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) recently vowed to change the chamber’s rules to advance such bills by January 17, progressives argue picking between the sweeping package and protecting U.S. democracy is a “false choice.”

Progressive campaigners plan to keep pushing for Congress to get the Build Back Better Act to Biden’s desk, Alex Lawson, executive director of Social Security Works, told the Post.

“The policies we’re fighting for—like letting Medicare negotiate prices—are incredibly popular in West Virginia, and Manchin is clearly not listening to people in his state,” he said. “Biden has to bring the full weight of the presidency to bear on Joe Manchin to get his vote to get Build Back Better across the finish line.”

RELATED: Biden doesn’t need Manchin: 5 executive actions he can take right now to build back better

“I know the grassroots are not in any way giving up on Joe Manchin,” Lawson added, “and we’ll make it harder and harder for him to not listen to what the people in West Virginia are demanding he do.”

Our Revolution agreed that the president “must use his power to deliver his full agenda,” declaring that “it’s the bare minimum to address the crises we face and begin to restore the trust of voters.”

3 New Year’s resolutions that will actually help you in the kitchen this year

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve slowly drifted away from New Year’s resolutions — or at least those of the overblown and unwieldy variety. In the past, I’ve definitely been guilty of jotting down items like “Eat healthier!” or “Improve my cooking!” but with no clear parameters for how to quantify either, motivation can definitely wane. 

This year, however, I’m keeping things simple. I do indeed want to continue to improve my cooking at home and narrowed down a few specific, measurable ways I could accomplish that. I’m sharing these goals not as some prescriptive “Three ways to make this your best year in the kitchen yet!” guide, but in the hopes that if, like me, you want to nourish yourself a little differently in the new year you have a blueprint to start. 

RELATED: The (cheap) tools that will transform your cooking in 2022

“Differently,” of course, means different things for different people. Perhaps you want to incorporate more plant-based meals into your diet, or you want to connect to your culture or home in a new way through your food. Maybe you want to develop a handy rotation of weeknight meals to take the guesswork out of cooking for your family, or you want to have the confidence to make or bake some special occasion stunners. 

Really try to narrow down what sounds the most interesting or fulfilling for you, and tailor these micro-goals to meet that.

1. Read (and hopefully use!) a new cookbook or two 

Cookbooks really are the gateway to changing how you do things in your home kitchen. They can open your eyes to new ingredients and techniques, as well as shift the sorts of flavors you pair together. Find a cookbook or two that captivates your interest and commit to cooking at least a few recipes from it. If you need a few suggestions, check out our editorial team’s picks for the best cookbooks and cocktail books of 2021. 

2. Choose a few restaurant favorites to perfect at home 

I was once out with some friends, several of whom were chefs. One of the group members, Dave, was lamenting how he didn’t know where to start when it came to learning to cook. One of the chefs asked what Dave liked to order when he was out. “Some kind of pasta and a strong Old Fashioned,” Dave replied. 

“Well,” the chef gently said. “Why don’t you start there?” 

I’ve always liked this advice because it’s a really simple way to really home in on the flavors that make you tick. Next time you’re feeling uninspired (or perhaps particularly adventurous), jot down a few restaurant dishes that you’d like to replicate at home. For what it’s worth, mine are good enchiladas verdes, saag paneer and naan, and a classic air mail cocktail. I’m also really excited to bring the Zuni chicken salad into my rotation, as inspired by Salon’s Mary Elizabeth Williams. 

3. Commit to perfecting a foundational cooking skill 

A few years ago, a professional acquaintance was scouting around for some talent for a new cooking series and emailed me to see if I would be interested in sending in an audition tape. I responded almost immediately: “Man, I’d love to, but my knife ‘skills’ are so bad and  I really don’t want to chop my finger off in front of the American public.” 

I’m not a professionally trained cook. The bulk of what I’ve learned came through family and friends, a lot of dedicated home study and even more trial and error. My knife skills have always lagged behind and this is the year that changes. I got some new sharp knives for Christmas and found some solid online tutorials to get me started. The whole thing is all very reminiscent of the scene from “Julie & Julia” when Julia Child, played by Meryl Streep, is tasked with chopping baskets and baskets of onions while she’s in culinary school. 

Maybe your knife skills are already pretty sharp (puns!), but there’s something else you’d like to take a stab (sorry) at mastering, like making the perfect hollandaise or actually making a viable sourdough starter. Give it a go this year. 

This list originally appeared in The Bite, Salon Food’s weekly food newsletter. Be sure to sign up for special essays, recipes and cooking advice. 

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The case for making whole-wheat pizza dough

The Perfect Loaf is a column from software engineer turned bread expert (and Food52’s Resident Bread Baker) Maurizio Leo. Maurizio is here to show us all things naturally leavened, enriched, yeast-risen, you name it — basically, every vehicle to slather on a lot of butter. Today, he’s discussing the pros and cons of whole-wheat pizza dough.

* * *

The longer I bake bread and cook pizza, the more I find I like increasing the whole-grain percentage in the dough. Sure, there’s an undeniable charm that comes with the classic Italian way: a 00-flour-based pizza that’s cooked at a super-high temperature, resulting in an exceedingly soft texture, tall rise, and open, airy crust. And while my sourdough bread almost always has some whole-grain component, lately, I’ve been pushing the whole grains in my naturally leavened pizza dough as well. Swapping out some white flour is an easy way to bring flavor to the next level: The added bran and germ mixed into the dough brings deeper grain flavors (read: nutty, earthy, and a touch of minerality), and when coupled with lengthy natural fermentation, you get a one-two punch of flavor and nutrition.

The challenge, though, is that adding more whole grains into a recipe (pizza and bread alike) typically means a squatter end result. The increased bran and germ in the dough begins to compromise dough structure and inhibit that tall rise and open, airy interior. But what these doughs lack in terms of loft, they more than make up for with flavor.

Let’s look at how we can bring these flavor and nutrition benefits to a sourdough pizza dough using whole grains.

How much whole-wheat flour should be in pizza?

Honestly, I don’t think you can go too far! I’ve had pizza made with 100 percent whole-wheat flour, and while it was a little more squat, a little chewier, and much heartier than a classic pizza, the flavor was great. Personally, I like to split the difference. Using half white flour (00 or all-purpose) and half whole-wheat is the best of both worlds: nice rise from the white flour and added flavor from the whole grains, all in a dough that’s still easy to stretch out to make your pie.

With sourdough pizza, typically the more whole grains you have in the mix, the more sour or complex the final flavor profile. I think this is partly why the longer I bake bread and cook pizza, the more I value having additional whole grains in a mix — the depth of flavor is just unmistakable. With pizza, though, going with a 50-50 blend of whole-wheat and white flour means added sourness, but not too much. It’s a wonderful complement to any toppings you might add, too, and really brightens the flavor of any cheese, meat, or vegetables you toss on top of your pizza.

What other flour can I use?

In addition to pure whole-wheat flour, using a different sifted variety such as Type 85 (which is somewhere between whole-wheat and white flour) is also a great option. This flour has more bran and germ present than white flour, but it’s not so much that you’re including the entire wheat berry, as with 100 percent whole-wheat. What I like about Type 85, which can sometimes be called “high extraction” flour, is that it performs and acts very similar to white flour, but there’s a big flavor boost from the fine bits of bran and germ still present in the flour. And there’s a wide range of these ratioed flours as well, running from Type 80 all the way to Type 110, which is much closer to whole-wheat than white — experiment to see which you prefer. White whole-wheat flour, which is whole-wheat flour made from white wheat berries, would also work here. It produces a mellower flavor profile, due to the reduction in tannins.

What modifications do I need to increase the whole grains even more?

When you bump up the whole-grain flour in a recipe, you’ll need to increase the hydration, due to the increased bran and germ particles in the flour, which tend to absorb more water. Additionally, you’ll have to watch the fermentation activity in the dough, as whole-wheat flour tends to increase the fermentation activity, due to the increased nutrients present. I like to drop my sourdough starter or levain percentage in a dough in lockstep with whole-grain flour increases. For example, if I wanted to make a 75 percent whole-wheat pizza dough, I’d drop the 18 percent starter called for in a 50 percent whole-wheat dough down to 15 percent.

How can I make my dough more soft?

One thought I considered when developing my whole-wheat sourdough pizza dough was to include a small percentage of extra-virgin olive oil into the dough. Some pizza enthusiasts might balk at the idea of this for a free-form pizza, but adding fat to a dough does help bring tenderness. We must also consider the fact that we’re making this pizza in a home oven, not a professional pizza oven, where it’ll take several more minutes to fully cook; the added fat helps keep the crust from drying out.

Adding some olive oil — I shoot for 1 to 2 percent of the total flour weight — brings just enough softness to offset the extended cook time necessary in a home oven. In fact, I actually take this route in my Sourdough Pizza Romana, which is cooked on a sheet pan and results in a dough that’s sturdy and crispy yet still somewhat chewy and soft. In the case of this recipe, though, I found the dough cooked up tall and was soft enough for me, but if you’re looking for a little more tenderness, a dash of olive oil added during the dough-mixing step is the answer

Making “Cobra Kai” great again: The series returns with a parable about the peril of bipartisanship

Sometimes we ask too much of the ones we love. We require them to meet our expectations and keep their promises. When they fall short, we explain that we're not angry, just disappointed.

We could be talking about parenting or politicians. Applying these statements to "Cobra Kai" also works, since it's a show about kids and the influential adults they look up to — namely Eagle Fang sensei Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka), Miyagi-Do sensei Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio), and Cobra Kai usurper John Kreese (Martin Kove).

That makes "Cobra Kai" a teen soap opera, albeit one where the kids and their elders attain existential clarity after beating one another to a pulp in a variety of settings including and not limited to: Daniel's home; a prom after-party; a hockey game; an Applebees; and the library. It's like  "Degrassi," see, only with hand-to-hand combat.

Daniel and Johnny's fight club adventures also have doubled as a cautionary parable about toxic masculinity, and the deleterious effects of nostalgia addiction, among other things. Laced throughout the rivalry between Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai are warnings about what can result from tribalism and an extremist devotion to domination.

But if the third season suffered because it seemed pointless, that may be because it was setting up season 4's warning about the perils of trusting in bipartisanship. You know, that vaunted virtue of politicians negotiating compromise in good faith. The current president swears it's possible. Everybody else has had their eyes open for the last two decades.

Bipartisanship only works when each side is willing to show their cards enough to make trades that strengthen everyone's hand. Otherwise, it's just one guy extending a hand to another ready to cut it off.

RELATED: Unless "Cobra Kai" learns new moves, it may be time for Netflix to sweep the leg

The new season of "Cobra Kai" plays this out under the rubric of honor and remaining true to traditions that have succeeded in the good old days, and showing how foolish it is to count on your rival adhering to either when their goal is to destroy you.

Johnny, reintroduced to us as a prime Trump-era hero, pounds out a win in the 2018 Under-18 All-Valley Karate Tournament through Cobra Kai's star pupil and surrogate son Miguel (Xolo Maridueña). Never is Johnny portrayed as a villain, just a misunderstood middle-aged man desperate to reclaim his lost glory.

He and Daniel can be furious with each other and find enough common ground to share a beer, although their occasional steps toward detente are forced by Danny's mentoring of Johnny's estranged son Robby (Tanner Buchanan), who eventually begins dating Daniel's daughter Sam (Mary Mouser).

Then came the Kreese-centered third season, when the show's momentum was nearly choked out by the writers' fealty to the original movies which, in the way of many franchises, diminished in quality with each new outing. Kove makes Kreese an impressive, cigar-chomping villain, but one whose motivation was never adequately established and failed to ground the season in fresh territory.

Instead, series creators' Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg end with Kreese's determination that all scores would be settled, once again, at yet another All-Valley Karate Tournament. The same place where Daniel defeated Johnny in 1984 and Kreese in 1985 . . . and where Miguel triumphs in 2018.

The danger of history repeating is a central theme of "Cobra Kai," but at the end of a comparatively shallow run this redux was less in keeping with that idea than evincing a creative death spiral.

But that season dropped before the Jan. 6 insurrection, prior to the installation of a new Democratic-majority Congress and a president calling for Democrats and Republicans to work together for the common good despite the GOP's complete lack of interest in doing so.

The fourth season's storylines may have been mapped out well before all of this given that it was picked up before the third debuted. Nevertheless, the parallels between the three-way rivalry of Daniel's Miyagi-Do, Johnny's Eagle Fang and Cobra Kai, led by Kreese and his returning partner Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) and the messy partisanship threatening democracy, are plain enough to restore the show's metaphorical relevance, whether that is intentional or accidental.

By now, Cobra Kai, Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang have students who have studied each school's styles. Of course, Cobra Kai as it is now isn't the version Johnny resurrected after Miguel's influence on him transformed "Strike First, Strike Hard, No Mercy" into a positive philosophy based in confidence and assertiveness.

Kreese, on the other hand, is a charismatic despot who teaches strength through violence, an approach embraced by Peyton List's Tory, a young woman ruled by her anger (and one of this season's standouts).

To defeat Kreese, Johnny and Daniel call a truce and combine dojos. But each is still set in his ways. Daniel is an adherent to Mr. Miyagi's teachings and too trusting that those who've learned from him share his sense of honor. Johnny's Way of the Fist aggression chafes against Miyagi's defensive style. Daniel is an '80s soft rock fan, Johnny worships Reagan-era metal. Their longstanding enmity was always going to prevent them from forging a partnership of equals.

Still, it may be strange to think of Johnny as the progressive wing of their shared party, but . . . there he is. He knows how ruthless the enemy can be, which is why his scrappy bunch trains inside a tetanus-trap of a warehouse. That way they can be ready for anything. Daniel trusts in the standard way of doing things, and is so sure that Miyagi-Do has the tournament in the bag that he forbids his students from learning Johnny's "strike first" style.

While this rift splits the good guys' forces, Daniel's former student Robby becomes the Steve Bannon of Cobra Kai, sharing theMiyagi-Do playbook with fellow students so they can defeat them at the competition. Sam knows what Robby is doing, as do Miguel and Hawk (Jacob Bertrand), another reformed Cobra. But Daniel, trusting in Robby's nonexistent honor, is unmoved.

If one were to view this season's All-Valley Karate tournament as an election – which it might as well be, since the agreement stipulates the losers close their dojos and never teach again – then what transpires there and the outcome should be viewed as a lesson and a warning.

Cobra Kai's students may waver at times, but never break ranks with their teachers or each other. Led by Tory and Robby, they fall behind Kreese and Silver and don't push back, even when they're directed to destroy their friends.

And thanks to the ostentatiously wealthy Silver, the dojo has deep pockets. Silver buys the Cobras the flashiest gear and equipment, attracting the best athletes in the area and offering picked-upon kids like Robby's mentee Kenny Payne (Dallas Dupree Young) training to subjugate their tormentors. Beyond a dojo, it's a snake den that makes evil look cool.

At the tournament, Miyagi-Do ekes out a key win only when Daniel and Johnny realize they must team up to defeat Cobra Kai's autocrats, men determined to train children to be monsters. But they arrive at that realization too late to beat an enemy that's been solidly united for weeks.

Make no mistake, "Cobra Kai" remains ridiculous. Never mind the fact that the central conflict concerns a karate studio in a strip mall run by a couple of old guys; this is a show in which adults have serious conversations that include the phrase "karate war."

Even so, Zabka's superb performance is unassailable, and Maridueña and Buchanan have each leveled up as actors. Among the younger cast those two, along with Bertrand, List (whose Tory receives an empathy-expanding backstory this season) and Young coax us to remain invested through its fatuity.

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Griffiths' arrival ensures there's plenty of that to go around, although the script eventually justifies Silver's dogged fidelity to Kreese in the many moments where it simply doesn't make sense. Kreese is a cult leader, a dictator. But Silver is a smoother politician capable of saying the right things and persuading anyone that they can be winners as long as they do as he does. He's proof that this apparently slight movie expansion understands the stealth with which corruption asserts itself.

Season 4 ends with Daniel renewing his vow to keep fighting, enlisting yet another star character from a past "Karate Kid" sequel to help. Said figure may be one of the last known franchise faces before the writers are forced to put out a call to "The Next Karate Kid," Hilary Swank. If that happens, let it be for deeper reasons than simply keeping the '80s alive.

Seeing "Cobra Kai" regain its form in the fourth round, however, has been a delight. This season reminds us that the show is at its best when it is about more than archive footage and karate kiais. Whenever it tells Americans about who we are and where we currently stand, it vaults from being another teenage entertainment to a fable with punch that lets us know we shouldn't count it out too soon.

All four seasons of "Cobra Kai" are currently streaming on Netflix.

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Tucker Carlson pitches potential new COVID treatment to Fox News viewers: Viagra

Fox News host Tucker Carlson isn’t too keen on vaccines — but did dedicate a segment of his Friday show to a potential new treatment for COVID-19: Viagra.

Yes, Pfizer’s popular erectile dysfunction drug is being used in a few select medical trials to determine if it helps in treating severe COVID-19 patients, though experts are quick to note that much research still needs to be conducted before determining its effectiveness. 

Yet the controversial Fox News host was quick to sing Viagra’s praises, opening the segment by declaring that it may “save us” from COVID-19. 

“Who thought Viagra would save us from the pandemic?” Carlson asked, adding: “Dr. Marc Siegel may have predicted it,” introducing one of the network’s top medical contributors, who listed off a series of claims about the drug’s effectiveness as a treatment for pulmonary hypertension and altitude sickness, among other things.

“Is there anything [Viagra] doesn’t cure?” Carlson quipped. 

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At one point, a graphic reading “Little Blue Miracle?” (referring to the name-brand pill’s signature blue color) appeared alongside Carlson as he relayed the story of a COVID-positive U.K. nurse who claims she was rescued from the depths of a 28-day coma just before Christmas by a “large dose of Viagra.”

The story of 37-year-old Monica Almedia was first reported this week, along with the news that scientists were attempting to use the drug — whose previous claim to fame was its penchant for reliably causing erections — to increase oxygen levels in the blood of hospitalized patients with extremely severe COVID-19.

“It was definitely the Viagra that saved me. Within 48 hours it opened up my airwaves and my lungs started to respond,” the fully vaccinated nurse told U.K. outlet “The Sun,” which featured her story on its front cover.

“If you think how [Viagra] works, it expands your blood vessels. I have asthma and my air sacs needed a little help.”

RELATED: How anti-vaxxers weaponized Ivermectin, a horse de-wormer drug, as a COVID-19 treatment

It’s not exactly a new idea — Dr. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center, told Salon via email that Sildenafil “has been used to modulate blood flow in the lungs for decades.”

But Adalja was also quick to note that it’s currently an experimental treatment for use on hospitalized patients with severe COVID — not something people should be seeking out as an at-home treatment or preventative measure.

“There are studies showing that it can be used in severe COVID patients to help increase blood flow into the lungs and improve oxygenation,” he said. “It’s important to realize, however, that the use of sildenafil is for a subset of patients with severe COVID and not a routine treatment.”

And despite Almedia’s subsequent pleas that people get vaccinated and take steps to protect themselves from the virus, it was the “miracle cure” angle that took off in the right-wing press, with the New York Post, Daily Wire and others dedicating full write-ups to Viagra’s promise as a COVID treatment.

Following the spate of coverage, the idea of using an erectile dysfunction drug to treat COVID-19 appeared to be gaining steam online, with the word “viagra” trending on Twitter and hundreds of posts on alternative social media sites such as TrumpWorld favorite GETTR extolling the virtue of this newfound “cure.”

“The life you save may be your own,” one user wrote on GETTR alongside a quote from Almedia about how Viagra saved her life. “GOT COVID? GET VIAGRA!” another declared.

“Viagra. First it cured Alzheimer’s and now cures COVID,” one person wrote, referencing another recent segment from “Tucker Carlson Tonight” in which he explored the use of Viagra for the treatment of Alzheimer’s Disease. “Hard to believe.”

RELATED: Ted Cruz apologizes for Jan. 6 “terrorist attack” comment after enduring Tucker Carlson’s wrath

It’s unclear whether Viagra will take off as an alternative right-wing COVID-19 drug in the same way as hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, two well-publicized but ultimately debunked treatments that shot to prominence after conservative pundits and politicians championed them as alternatives to vaccination.

In the case of ivermectin, poison control hotlines and hospitals were flooded last year with reports of people overdosing on a version of the anti-parasite drug meant for livestock, which they had acquired in a last-ditch attempt to prevent and treat themselves after refusing to be vaccinated. The series of events spurred much mockery online — a trend that was alive and well following Carlson’s Viagra segment Friday night as well.

A search for “Viagra” on Twitter returned thousands of tweets making fun of the idea being pushed in some right-wing circles — including several times on Carlson’s show — that Pfizer would hide thousands of deaths due to the vaccine while simultaneously hiding another drug which worked much better against the virus.

“You’re all a bunch of sheep supporting BIG PHARMA! Now if you’ll excuse me I’m off to the drug store to buy some Covid Viagra because Tucker Carlson told me if I don’t die with a boner I’m a Cuck,” Twitter user @GordMacey wrote. 

“Sure, Viagra treats COVID,” user @Westfalljim5 added. “In fact, the side effects warning has been updated: ‘Seek immediate medical help if you experience an INSURECTION lasting more than 4 hours.'”

Fox News did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

Watch the full “Tucker Carlson Tonight” clip below:

50 years on, “The Joy of Sex” is outdated in parts but still a fun “unanxious” romp

First published in 1972, “The Joy of Sex” styled itself as a sexual cookbook, with positions and predilections presented as loose recipes.

As any good cookbook author knows, however, sometimes people really need a picture to be able to get a sense of the finished dish. The success of the book owes much to its plentiful graphic sketches, as well as its playful and unanxious approach to sex (“unanxious” is a word the book’s author uses a lot).

For many of us born in the 1970s, ’80s, and early ’90s, “The Joy of Sex” changed everything. Not in the way it was intended, of course (as a gourmet guide to lovemaking), but rather as the transmitter of the awful realization that not only did our parents have sex, but they were keen to do it joyfully. So keen, in fact, that they had bought, and presumably read, a 250-page erotic guide.

Such was the popularity of the book (it has sold over 12 million copies worldwide and been translated into more than a dozen languages) that it became relatively commonplace for people to have it on their shelves or even coffee tables.

The book’s cover lists Alex Comfort, a physician, novelist and poet, as its editor. But rather than gently editing the sexual advice and escapades of a happily married couple, Comfort later revealed he had written the book himself, with the help of his long-time mistress (also his wife’s best friend and his subsequent wife). His private polaroids and descriptions of sexual positions served as the basis for many of the sketches in the book, along with photographs taken of colour illustrator Charles Raymond and his wife Edeltraud that Chris Foss used as references for his line drawings.

Today, this backstory of subterfuge and polaroiding adds to what is already a pretty unusual read. There is liberal talk of grope suits, the buttered bun, the goldfish, and railways (not what you think). At the time of publication, the book was revolutionary — perhaps not in its content, but in its popularity. It followed Alfred Kinsey’s books on sexual behaviour in men and women in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

By the early 1970s the sexual revolution was underway, and it is possible that the “Joy of Sex” both reflected an increased societal focus on sexual pleasure and worked to enhance it.

Doing sex properly (original title)

At its core, the book’s advice is pretty simple. Comfort urges the reader to be open minded about sex, to explore and experiment, and to communicate without judgement. Fifty years on, this is all still good advice.

Qualitative research (focused on themes rather than data) shows that many people see sexual satisfaction as reflecting sexual openness and a willingness to act out desires, as well as the more obvious benchmarks like orgasm and sexual frequency. People who really communicate with their partner about what turns them on (and what doesn’t) and who are ready to talk about the often embarrassing nitty gritty of sex, tend to report having better sex. They also report better relationships overall (perhaps in large part because of the better sex).

And it’s not just that people who are better at communicating in general are also better at communicating about sex — rather, there appears to be something special about talking openly about sexual wants and needs that improves both sexual and overall relationship satisfaction.

It’s not just the hair that’s outdated though

Today, there is a lot in the book that is dated, outmoded, or incorrect. Comfort appears fixated with sexual perfectionism. Although he dismisses some sexual myths (such as the inherent superiority of a “vaginal” versus “clitoral” orgasm) he does seem to believe most sexual encounters can (and perhaps should) be characterized by simultaneous orgasms. Subsequent research demonstrates that when we demand sexual perfectionism (in ourselves, or our partners) we tend to enjoy sex a lot less.

The book is very strongly geared towards heterosexual cisgender sex — a modern reimagining of the book would need an enhanced focus on gender and sexual identity diversity, and the many ways we have sex. (Note there have been revised editions and spin-offs including “The Joy of Gay Sex” and “The Joy of Lesbian Sex”.)

The advice in the original, however, around open and non-judgemental communication about sex and sexual needs feels relevant to everyone. And Comfort acknowledges there are groups of people for whom other books are needed. Although his language around these issues is awkward under today’s gaze, there is a broad acceptance of same-gender attractions (without citing any evidence Comfort happily claims everyone is bisexual) and aspects of gender fluidity.

There are still more aspects of the book that need revision or updating, but also delightful inclusions in the 1972 edition.

There are the many unusual assumptions. When talking about male turn-ons (termed “releasers”), for example, Comfort confidently declares:

A horse, seen from behind, is a male ‘releaser’ – it has long hair, big buttocks, and a teetering walk. A cow isn’t.

In fact, there is a lot of talk of horses, horse symbolism, and riding play throughout the book.

Comfort rails against deodorant and cautions lovers never to wear it.

Elsewhere he helpfully warns:

[…] the only really disturbing manifestation of love music is when the woman laughs uncontrollably – some do. Don’t be uptight about this.

Today’s scientific support for “The Joy of Sex” as a whole is mixed, and the book is dated, and cis-heterosexual and male-centred. But is it still joyful? Yes, it is.

The central message — that sex can be a source of pleasure, love, communion, and play — remains as true today as it was in 1972. There are some good tips in there, too, if you can sort the horses from the cows. So excuse me, while I read up on the buttered bun.

Fiona Kate Barlow, Senior Research Fellow, The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Omicron is surging, and scientists are optimistic. How can both of these things be true?

The omicron variant’s rapid ascent to dominance has been a wild story, full of unexpected twists and turns — and, contradictions. It is incredibly contagious, more so than COVID-19’s delta variant; yet it is also less deadly, and its victims are less likely to become seriously ill. Omicron will likely infect many more people than other variants because of how infectious it is; but it is also supposedly going to peak, fizzle out, and possibly mark the end of the pandemic (and the onset of an endemic). 

How can all this be true at once? 

The history and future of omicron are difficult to pinpoint: Omicron’s origins remain mysterious, as it existed for more than a year before scientists first noticed it in Botswana and, soon after, neighboring South Africa. That said, if the situation in South Africa, where omicron surged and fell rapidly, is any harbinger about what will happen in the United States, Americans can take hope: In that nation, the virus’ trajectory resembles a cliff, quickly rising and then plummeting with stunning swiftness. The Southern Hemisphere nation has also seen an encouraging lack of hospitalizations — at least, when compared to other strains from the pandemic.

Yet there are key differences, demographic and otherwise, between South Africa and the United States that could complicate this projection. As Chicago Department of Public Health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady explained in a press conference on Tuesday, these confounding variables include vaccination rates, the age distribution across the population, and high rates of infection. There are other regions of the world whose demographic profiles are closer to America’s, and whose omicron surges therefore offer a more reliable comparison.

RELATED: Omicron’s lower mortality rate may be explained by how the variant spreads through the body

“We are watching really closely what is happening in Europe and in the UK, because sort of after seeing that surge in Southern Africa, the next place we really saw omicron surge was in the UK, in Europe,” Arwady told reporters. “We have not clearly seen yet a sign of decrease in those settings. It’s always a little bit tricky around the holidays because testing just gets disrupted in different ways.”

“Reporting of cases is often delayed during the two weeks beginning shortly before Christmas until shortly after New Year’s Day,” Dr. Jeffrey Shaman, an infectious disease modeler and epidemiologist at Columbia University, wrote in The New York Times. “As a consequence, reported case numbers can give the misleading short-term appearance of steep case increases, or even declines.”

He added, “All these issues create uncertainty and limit how far we can reliably project the burden of Omicron.”

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What scientist are certain about is why the variant is so transmissible. Imagine that the SARS-CoV-2 virus is a sea urchin, only its spines are used as picks to unlock your cells so they can enter and replicate. The COVID-19 vaccines are designed to thwart the virus by creating antibodies that target the proteins which create those spines, appropriately known as the spike proteins. Omicron has 30 mutations located near its spike protein, and mutations on the spike proteins may help the virus partially evade vaccine-based immunity or entirely evade the body’s attempts to defend itself.

That is why the headlines have been full of reports about record-breaking COVID-19 infection rates. On Wednesday more than 4,000 children were hospitalized with COVID-19 across the United States, according to The Washington Post. This was a new record, far surpassing the figures from the summer caused by the then-dominant delta variant; fewer than 2,000 children had been hospitalized with COVID-19 nationwide on Christmas, less than two weeks earlier. On Monday, the United States broke its single-day record for reporting new COVID-19 cases. According to the same data, which was compiled by Johns Hopkins University, the United States had the largest seven-day average of daily new cases of any country tracked over the past week.

Yet because experts believe there will be fewer severe illnesses, there will also likely be fewer hospitalizations. This has been seen in many other countries where there have been omicron outbreaks, from the United Kingdom to South Africa. The question, of course, is just how many fewer there will be in the United States.

“Whether hospitals experience more or less strain than they did in January 2021 will depend on case numbers and how severe they are,” Shaman writes. “For example, if twice as many people become infected but these people are half as likely to be hospitalized, the demand for hospital beds would be the same. This calculus also applies to estimated deaths from the virus, as well as expected disruptions to the work force.”

While scientists are unclear about why there seem to be fewer severe illnesses, one possible explanation came from a recent study by researchers at Hong Kong University. They found that the omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 has a more difficult time replicating in lung tissue than either the widespread delta variant or the original SARS-CoV-2 virus. If true, this would make it more difficult for the virus to spread to other tissues of the body as well. That is good news when it comes to omicron, but bad news when it comes to other COVID-19 strains — and scientists worry there will be more.

“It’s a certainty,” Dr. William Haseltine, a biologist renowned for his work in confronting the HIV/AIDS epidemic, fighting anthrax and advancing knowledge of the human genome, told Salon earlier this month. “It’s not a fear. There will be more variants. It is as close to a certainty as you can get.”

Read more on omicron’s rise:

5 best kitchen floor materials to weather all the spills and stains

There are a lot of decisions to be made when renovating or designing any room in your house, but much-lauded spots like the kitchen often take even more consideration. After all, it’s no secret kitchens are the heart of the home, and many homeowners desire a space that functions as a do-it-all masterpiece — a place that is as beautiful as it is functional, as trendy as it is timeless, and as durable as it is desirable.

Good kitchens start with a good foundation — in this case, flooring. There are many opinions regarding the best flooring for a kitchen and, while there are pros and cons to each material, it often comes down to personal preference. Some homeowners feel strongly about seamless flooring throughout the entire first floor, while others love the old-school appearance of well-worn stone in a kitchen. To help you choose the best option for your home, we’re rounding up the most popular picks below, plus some important info to keep in mind when choosing the right material for you.

Hardwood floors

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Hardwood floors remain one of the most popular picks for kitchens, thanks in large part to the warmth they bring to an otherwise utilitarian space. Kitchens can have a lot of hard surfaces (think: stone countertops, metal fixtures, and stainless steel appliances), so it’s nice to bring in a bit of natural texture in the way of a hardwood floor underneath. Hardwood floors (either solid hardwood or engineered hardwood, which is top layer veneer of real wood that’s been backed by a layer of plywood) are also a great kitchen flooring option for homeowners who have an open floor plan and would prefer the look of one seamless flooring option throughout the entire level of their home.

Still, hardwood floors are not without their pitfalls in a kitchen. They tend to be softer, so dropping hard or heavy items (like pots and pans) on them can leave visible marks. Then there’s the potential of water. With so many things that can leak in a kitchen — including a dishwasher, sink, and refrigerator — many experts caution against hardwood floors, which can be more susceptible to moisture and water damage. If you choose to go with hardwood floors in your kitchen, work with a professional to determine the best sealing and finishing technique that will help them stand up a bit more to the risk of moisture.

Ceramic tile

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For many, ceramic tile is the ideal kitchen flooring material. Not only is it practically impervious to water, stains, and nicks, but it comes in a variety of shapes, styles, and colors suited to nearly any decor vibe (you can even find ceramic tiles meant to look like planks of hardwood). Made from natural clay and fired under extreme heat, ceramic tile stands up to daily life with very little visible wear or issues. Additionally, they’re easy to clean and resistant to water, which is great if you’re worried about spills or leaks.

While there are few gripes to be had with ceramic tile, it is important to note that aesthetically it can be hard to blend with the rest of the flooring in your home if you live in an open floor plan. Additionally, ceramic tile can be much cooler underfoot than flooring like hardwood — to overcome this issue, consider installing radiant heat beneath the floors or style your space with a few rugs or runners.

Natural stone

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Natural stone floors — like marble, slate, travertine, granite, and sandstone — have long been in favor as kitchen flooring options and signal a luxury, high-end kitchen like few other things can. When cared for properly, these stones can last decades and are great for homeowners looking to lend a timeless look to their kitchen. In fact, natural stones are often chosen by designers when working in new builds to lend a little effortless “age” to a home.

While specific care and cautions can range depending on the type of natural stone you choose (for instance, marble can be slippery when wet, while travertine has a textured finish that grime can cling to easily), all-natural stone flooring needs to be sealed properly and periodically in order to maintain its appeal in your home. Without proper sealing, natural stone can be susceptible to water and stain penetration over time. Likewise, natural stones can be cool and hard underfoot, so place a washable runner anywhere you spend a lot of time standing, like in front of the kitchen sink.

Luxury vinyl flooring

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If you’re looking for an option that bottles natural appeal with 21st-century technology, look no further than luxury vinyl flooring. Often referred to as LVF, luxury vinyl flooring is a family- and life-friendly alternative to hardwood. It’s designed in long, interlocking planks and consists of several layers of vinyl, including a design layer that gives the product the look and texture of stone or wood. Often touted as indestructible, LVF is extremely durable, waterproof, cushioned underfoot, and easy to install. Translation: It will hold up to that spilled bottle of wine, dropped dish, or heavy furniture just fine.

LVF can sometimes look “off” when placed adjacent to a true hardwood floor, so that’s something to keep in mind if you have an open floor plan. Additionally, you’ll get more bang for your buck when it comes to resale value if you opt for a natural stone or hardwood floor. Still, with more homeowners choosing LVF products by the day, that could very well change in the coming years.

Cement tile

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Cement tiles are beloved by designers and homeowners alike for the beautiful charm and bespoke patina they lend to any space. They can be seen all over Europe in bistros and corner cafes, and have since made their way to our homes as a way to lend history, and often color, to a kitchen. Though they’re most frequently seen as backsplash tile, cement tiles can be used as a kitchen flooring material if installed and protected properly.

The issue with cement tile lies in the way it’s made. Unlike ceramic tile, which is cured at a high temperature in a kiln, cement tile is cured at room temperature with the color layer on top, making it more porous and susceptible to stains and marks. Proper sealing is a must, as is a bit of checked expectations: Cement tiles will show wear over time, but it’s often that “life well lived” look that many people are after. If you’re a fan of patina and want your kitchen to look like it existed for centuries before you, cement tile may be a good fit.

“Yellowstone” becomes the most popular show on cable

Conventional wisdom has it that no linear TV show can capture a huge audience in the age of streaming. “Nah,” says “Yellowstone.” The Kevin Costner-led drama about a Montana ranching family just aired its fourth season finale on the Paramount Network, and according to Deadline, it crushed it. “Grass on the Streets and Weeds on the Rooftops” brought in 9.3 million total viewers in Live+Same Day ratings, up +81% from the season 3 finale. Add in the viewers from the simulcast on CMT, and you’ve got 10.3 million.

Overall, the “Yellowstone” finale was the most watched telecast on cable since “The Walking Dead” season 8 premiere on AMC back in 2017, which got 11.4 million viewers. And things could just get bigger from here.

“‘Yellowstone’ continues to shatter records with more than 11 million viewers tuning into the season finale, proving we’ve hit a cultural nerve – from the center of the country to each of the coasts – and still have lots of room to grow on linear,” said ViacomCBS executive Chris McCarthy. “Our strategy to franchise ‘Yellowstone’ into a universe of series to fuel growth for Paramount+ is already exceeding expectations with ‘1883’ and ‘Mayor of Kingstown’ proving to be two of the top titles.”

Where to stream “Yellowstone”

It’s true that ViacomCBS has started to branch out, to create a “Yellowstone” cinematic universe, if you will. “1883” is a prequel series that follows the Duttons as they first set out to Montana back in the 1880s, and it’s been a hit for Paramount+.

That said, you won’t actually be able to stream “Yellowstone” itself on Paramount+, at least not right now. The first three seasons are available to stream on rival streaming service Peacock, of all places. Peacock creator NBCUniversal got the streaming rights to the show a few years back; perhaps ViacomCBS didn’t expect the show to become the hot property it is back then and just wanted the licensing fees. I’m sure they’re kicking themselves now.

We’ll see if “Yellowstone’s” winning streak continues with season 5, probably out later this year.

Right-wing Catholic boomlet grows: “Gun Girl” signs up with Mother Church

In early December, Kaitlin Bennett, the 20-something far-right provocateur known as “Kent State Gun Girl,” who has made a career out of recording herself antagonizing liberal college students, issued a new set of self-mythologizing images. In a wordless four-minute video that begins with the sound of a fetal heartbeat, a series of slow-motion shots juxtapose Catholic iconography with a pregnant Bennett caressing her belly in front of altars, sitting in pews, holding rosary beads, and smiling gently at the camera. The final shot pans slowly up Bennett’s body — from feet to form-fitting dress to waist-length blond hair — before ascending into an identical pan over a statue of the Virgin Mary. 

The pregnancy announcement video was posted on Liberty Hangouts, a right-wing website and YouTube channel founded by Bennett’s husband, which bills itself as “the official home of Kaitlin Bennett.” But this was just part two of another big reveal several days earlier, when Bennett announced she was no longer an atheist, but had converted to Roman Catholicism, thanks to various factors: her husband’s devout belief, her cat getting sick, and a liberal protester she tangled with who expressed hostility toward religion.

Days later, a pop-religion website owned by Catholic media giant EWTN, the largest religious media network worldwide, covered the news like a breathless tabloid “baby bump” watch. Bennett began appearing on right-wing Catholic shows, like that of LifeSiteNews, to discuss her conversion and her conviction that LGBTQ Pride Month was a manifestation of the worst of the seven deadly sins. She tweeted a picture of herself in a white lace mantilla after attending her first Traditional Latin Mass, and her husband, Justin Moldow, told Catholic-right YouTuber Timothy Gordon that filming his wife being jeered off college campuses had “truly felt like I was witnessing the Passion of the Christ in that moment.” 

RELATED: Kent State “gun girl” Kaitlin Bennett — too extreme for the Trump campaign?

In an era of deeply silly fame-seeking internet personas, Bennett’s performance as a stuntwoman of the far right manages to stand out. As president of Kent State’s Turning Point USA chapter in 2017, she oversaw a “diaper protest” mocking the notion of campus “safe spaces” that managed to embarrass the national TPUSA, ultimately ending her relationship with the group. The next year, she became internet-famous for posting a graduation picture of herself wearing a short dress, heels and an AR-10. She briefly worked with Alex Jones’s conspiracy theory outfit Infowars, shot up a paper sign reading “Happy Holidays,” and marketed an endless array of “gun girl” merch. (As Ruth Graham noted in a Slate profile after Bennett was run off Ohio University’s Athens campus, Bennett’s own social media accounts declare her intent to “monetize the haters.”) 

But beneath the lib-trolling spectacle, there’s a deeper pattern at work. For one thing, Liberty Hangout, run by Bennett and Moldow, has a long history of hard-right politics, advancing conspiracy theories like “White genocide,” making reference to the white supremacist “14 words,” and polling its readership on whether the Holocaust really happened quite the way they were taught in school. (“It doesn’t seem possible six million were killed,” the group’s Twitter account argued.) On its podcast throughout the early years of the Trump presidency, the group hosted a string of “alt-right” celebrities, including some of the people found liable this past November for inciting violence at the 2017 Unite the Right protest in Charlottesville, Virginia. But over the last couple of months the account has transformed into such a uniform stream of Catholic imagery that followers complained they’d gone “from being all about America and liberty to being all about the Vatican and Mexicans” (the latter apparently in response to a post featuring a Mexican saint).  

In this, Liberty Hangout and its combative star were retracing a path taken by a number of other far-right activists associated with remnants of the alt-right and the movements jockeying to take its place. After Canadian white supremacist personality Faith Goldy was fired from her position at the right-wing outlet Rebel News for appearing on a podcast of the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer, she made a very visible return to Catholicism, and has found a warm welcome in some corners of the Catholic right. A year ago, Stop the Steal founder Ali Alexander made a splashy announcement of his own conversion to the Catholic Church only days before he helped direct a mob of protesters to the U.S. Capitol. Several months later, in mid-March, disgraced former Breitbart writer and alt-right star Milo Yiannopoulos told LifeSiteNews that returning to the Catholic Church had helped him become “ex-gay.”

They were joining a number of other far-right figures who have conspicuously intertwined their political advocacy with right-wing Catholicism, including Jack Posobiec, the Pizzagate promoter turned right-wing commentator, and Nicholas Fuentes, the youthful founder of the America First or “groyper” movement, who has built a massive online following. When the various factions of the alt-right decided to gather in Charlottesville in the summer of 2017, they did most of their pre-rally organizing in chat rooms online. One of the most popular, named the “Nick Fuentes Server,” was dedicated to Catholics seeking “to explore the connections between their church” and Unite the Right. Hundreds of posters in that room talked about traditionalist Catholicism and posted memes with Crusades-era imagery and rhetoric alongside overtly antisemitic and pro-Nazi posts. 

“Once the alt-right disintegrated in 2018 and 2019, a number of them turned inward, toward religion, now that they’ve been de-platformed and their first attempts to change society have been rebuffed,” said Ben Lorber, a research analyst at Political Research Associates who has studied Fuentes’ movement. “It seems like a way to get a foot back into the mainstream for people like [Yiannapoulos] who were excluded during the years of the alt-right.” 

For moderate or liberal Catholics concerned about the extreme political divides within their church, these were worrying developments — part of the increasing entanglement of American Catholicism with ever-more right-wing U.S. politics, which over the last five years has included large swaths of the far right using Catholic imagery or appending phrases like  “Deus Vult” and “Viva Cristo Rey“  to their tweets.

To Tablet Vatican correspondent Christopher Lamb, author of a papal biography, “The Outsider: Pope Francis and His Battle to Reform the Church,” which details the growing political polarization within the world’s largest religious denomination, this was evidence of the far right’s efforts to infuse their movement with spiritual purpose. When you already trade in the politics of identity, Lamb asked, “How do you deepen that tribalism? You do it through religious imagery. In a sense, you empty the content of the religious and use the externals — the rosary beads, the crucifix, some words, perhaps some prayers — but you use it as an identity marker to give your movement a sense that it has a soul or deeper intensity at a moral level.”

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David Lafferty, a writer at Where Peter Is, a moderate Catholic website that tracks the influence of the Catholic right within the church. offered a similar analysis. “I think there’s a broader pattern here, where a lot of people who are part of the larger populist right, or MAGA movement, or what used to be called the alt-right, are willing to use any opportunity to find a new audience,” he said. “When you tap into the ecosystem of online Catholicism, you’ve got a built-in audience with big traditionalist or ultra-conservative Catholic sites, all of which have very devoted followers and fan bases. If you’re coming from the populist right into the church, you’re going to be able to walk right into that world and become a sort of instant celebrity.”

That influence trading works in both directions. This past week, as LifeSiteNews hosted Bennett to detail her conversion story, Bennett’s former employers at Infowars hosted LifeSite’s cofounder for a long interview about vaccine disinformation, Catholicism’s “civil war,” and what Jones described as an “Antichrist system” composed of “mass surveillance, transhumanism [and] the Great Reset agenda.” 

“It shows that this movement has no limits. There is no cutoff point,” said Lamb. “The way they’re operating is that anyone who agrees with their ideology is an ally, regardless of anything else. You can deny that children were murdered at the Sandy Hook massacre, as long as you agree with me on COVID. If you agree with me, anything goes.”

“I pray that maybe there’s something genuine in there, and she’ll drop off the radar and become a humble person trying to be a good Catholic,” Lafferty said of Bennett’s conversion, and others by prominent far-right figures. “Somehow, I doubt that. I think there are larger forces here, ready to use anything that’s available to spread the right-wing populist message, gain more followers, cause more controversy.”

Read more on the religious right’s rising power in the Trump era:

Celebrating “great songwriter” David Bowie’s 75th birthday & introducing him to a new generation

Pianist Mike Garson will never forget his first concert ever with David Bowie. It was September 22, 1972, and Bowie and the Spiders from Mars were kicking off the U.S. leg of the Ziggy Stardust Tour in Cleveland, Ohio. Garson’s background was in jazz, not rock ‘n’ roll — in fact, he didn’t know who Bowie was before joining the band — and so he wasn’t necessarily prepared for what he’d encounter.

“I’m coming from jazz clubs, right — 10 people making $5. Right now, I’m in front of thousands of people, and they’re going nuts,” Garson recalls today. “All fine — I had heard that would happen. And he’s singing great and the Spiders from Mars are playing great.” 

After the band finished the encore, things got interesting. Bowie and the rest of the band “[took] off through the back door at a speed you wouldn’t believe. And I’m thinking, ‘Why are they running?'” Garson says. “And then I see thousands of people storming the stage — and I’m collecting my music. I just joined the band — and all of a sudden, I’m under attack.”

Today, on a Zoom call in mid-December 2021, the musician laughs heartily at the memory. After all, nearly 50 years later, Garson is still associated with Bowie. On Jan. 8, he’s helming the second annual A Bowie Celebration, which brings together musicians who played with Bowie and musicians who are fans for a night celebrating the music. 

RELATED: Rebel, alien, cynic, dream: David Bowie’s chimerical genius, and cultural importance, go way beyond pop music

Through the magic (and power) of technology, as well as old-fashioned hard work — Garson says it’s “15-hour days, seven days a week, for at least usually a month or two” — the streaming tribute is a loving homage to Bowie’s work. Guests this year include Def Leppard vocalist Joe Elliott, Duran Duran‘s Simon Le Bon and John Taylor, Living Colour, Noel Gallagher, Matchbox 20’s Rob Thomas, Walk the Moon, Jake Wesley Rogers, and more.

Garson says he was asked to do tribute bands while Bowie was alive, but declined. “Why would I do that?” he says. “Of course not. I play only with him.” However, in Bowie’s absence, covering his songs is a way to elevate them so the music is considered on par with other greats. “He’s a great songwriter,” Garson says. “So why not have great singers sing his songs in the same spirit of people singing George Gershwin, Burt Bacharach, Marvin Hamlisch, or Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, Michel Legrand?”

Garson credits his jazz background for this songbook-driven perspective. “We would take songs from Broadway shows, Miles Davis songs, ”Round midnight’ by [Thelonious] Monk,” he explains. “Hundreds of jazz musicians would record in their own way, these great jazz or Broadway standards. Why should that not be for Bowie’s catalog? That’s my mission, to bring it to new generations.”

Although Garson says some pairings didn’t end up working out for this year’s tribute (“There were a few songs I couldn’t find singers for this time that I wanted to do very badly — I’ll do next year”), he can’t say enough good things about the artists performing this year. 

And even though the technological aspect of putting the show together can be occasionally fraught, he knows all will turn out well. “It is a gift and we’re celebrating David’s music,” Garson says. “So I feel his spiritual support from wherever he is, whatever dimension he’s in. I can feel him sometimes — not all the time, but sometimes. And it keeps me on path that it is a celebration of his music.”

Garson, who’s also keeping busy doing Zoom masterclasses and finishing up a classical album, checked in with Salon about some Bowie memories and how the show will play out.

What were your takeaways from last year? What, if anything, did you want to do differently this year?

The final result last year was fantastic. I didn’t appreciate it when it went on the air. Because of COVID, there were so many things that I would have changed that the listeners or fans wouldn’t recognize, but I knew. Little things: The saxophone [or] the drums weren’t there, the wrong drummer [was] on this song. All these factors that literally were driving me psychotic. I was having a breakdown when everyone was having a ball. I felt like Debbie Downer. 

[At other times] friends of mine and alumni who played on it, they weren’t being acknowledged or in the right place. Things were missed because of COVID. I couldn’t be there for the final mixes to say,  “Okay.” This time, we’re a little better. Things are still a little nutty, but we’re fixing that. 

Musician Mike Garson, former member of David Bowie's touring bandMusician Mike Garson, former member of David Bowie’s touring band, performs onstage during the second annual Above Ground concert on September 16, 2019 in Los Angeles (Scott Dudelson/Getty Images)

It’s one of those things where you want to honor David’s memory and his music. And this event is commemorating his 75th birthday as well. Plus, you have this bar you set last year — and it’s like, how do you top yourself? You always want to do better.

It’s challenging. I’ve never been in that situation. People who were stars and singers who have number one hits, then they have to do another album. They’re probably freaked out [that] they’ll never top it. Many never do top it, historically. And then those who are trying to chase it usually are frustrated. 

This is the first time I’ve ever thought, I have to see if I could . . . not top it, but do something comparably as good and maybe more interesting, I can tell you for sure some of my piano playing and some of the recordings are better. That’s a good sign. And 50% of the songs are new, and 50% of the songs we’ve done with different singers.

[The conversation turns to some of the returning performers joining the tribute this year, including Def Leppard’s Joe Elliott — who performed “Goodnight Mr. Jones” in a remote fashion along with band members in 2021 — and Simon Le Bon and John Taylor of Duran Duran; the latter two and the rest of the band performed “Five Years” in 2021. Garson also appeared on Duran Duran’s 2021 album “Future Past,” on the song “Falling.”]

Five years ago, I was touring with the Bowie alumni after David passed. [Simon] was one of the first to jump on stage in Brixton, in London, and he sang with us. I remember playing Royal Albert Hall in the ’90s with Bowie. I walked backstage — there he was, I mean, these guys wouldn’t miss the show. 

[There’s also Def Leppard vocalist] Joe Elliott. [Last year] we did a song he wrote for David called “Goodnight Mr. Jones.” His words are exquisite. The melody and the chords are exquisite. That’s the only, so to speak, non-Bowie song, but it feels like a Bowie song. The words and his love for David come flying out when he sings. 

I was playing with the band [on the song], and right behind me there was Joe on the screen, bigger than life. It’s a new way to create music. Would I have known any of this three years ago? No. And would have I known the internet or ways to communicate were available 20 or 30 years ago? You have to stay with the times stay current. If you want to feel any validity and feel any presence and be moving on. 

David called me [in the ’90s] and started yakking away about this thing called the internet. And I [was like], “What are you talking about David?” I was thinking about a song I was performig. He said “Mike, stop everything, you’ve got to do this.” And I kind of thought he was out of his mind. And look at his predictions and all of that. He was way ahead of the time, and I wasn’t. So I’m in it now and I’m kind of grooving with it.

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You mentioned Bowie’s ’90s work. There’s a new box set that recently came out with on Rhino covering this era, which one of my favorite Bowie eras. And I feel like it’s getting a little bit more shine than maybe it received at the time. 

Finally!

What do you remember most about that time then about recording with him? 

That was that was some of my favorite stuff. Recording on the “Outside” album would have been my favorite album I ever played on in terms of creativity. 

Wow!

“Aladdin Sane” would be the only other one that would be comparable. But this whole album was improvised. We didn’t even know what we were doing. We were just fooling around for two weeks in the studio with two tape machines, Sony machines connected together. We had 48 channels and there was a camera on every musician. Someday I would love them to release all that stuff, but it would probably take 1,000 hours to just put it together because each musician had a camera on [them]. I often wonder where that film is. 

Anyway, we’d be playing for six, eight hours a day improvising, and these cameras were filming it. So this material is infinite, and you get an hour album out of that. But God knows how much other material is floating around. I felt it was one of David’s most creative periods. 

RELATED: Time has changed David Bowie: He can trace time

He came to me in ’93 or ’94 and said, “Mike, I’m going to the musicians that influenced my life the most. I’m going to you, Brian Eno, Reeves Gabrels, Carlos Alomar. And we’re going to Montreux, and we’re going to make an improvised album. Because I need to revitalize myself, because I feel I sold out a little in the ’80s. I was forced by the record companies to do commercial things and keep trying to get hits, and while some of the music was good, it’s not what I’m most proud of. I need a restart, and we’re going to do it.” 

And from that moment on, we were in creative mode — to the last show we ever played, right when he had his heart attack. 

When you were playing live with Bowie, how much was it planned, and how much it be he’d call an audible and you had to be on your feet? What was that like as a musician playing live with him?

When we did the Reality tour, we did about 113 shows before he got sick. And we had about 63 or 70 songs ready to go. At any given show, we did maybe 23 to 28 songs. He would throw curves at us in the middle of the show when we started to feel confident because we’re out on the road. It was a little frightening because the engineers and the sound people and everyone would have to switch gears. But we always pulled it off. Most of the time, we had a set and we stuck with the set. But like I said, when he felt comfortable, he started messing with it. It was fun. 

I was the loose cannon. I played in somewhere between nine and 13 bands with him over a 40-year span. And so I was a loose cannon in that everybody pretty much played parts, and they stuck to them, and it sounded like the record and the song. I was the one who was allowed to improvise and go left and go right and do this and do that. That is the only reason I was able to stay with them, because I’m an improvising pianist and musician. So whatever I’m hearing and feeling in the moment, I play. Every time I play a song, it’s different. 

That’s also a really good counterpoint to anything going on in the stage. There’s an X factor —you don’t know what it’s going to be, and you’re going to get something different every night. I would imagine as a creative person, that’s also exciting, because that keeps it interesting for you

Very much so. And I remember sitting with David one day on the bus when we were going from town to town. He was reading some book or showed me something, and it was called “The X Factor.” And it’s this thing that you just alluded to — that’s what makes creating and art magical. Otherwise, I couldn’t be doing this at 76 years old, starting at 14 and never having stopped. If that X factor wasn’t there, I would have been burned out. 

Most people can’t keep a job for three months. You know, I’m doing the same thing for 62 years, non-stop, [and] loving it. [Laughs.] And David is the biggest part of my life. but I’ve done it for Stan Getz, Elvin Jones, [Smashing] Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails, Halsey recently. It’s just never ending, because I love music and I like to create. And anyone could feel that from anyone else who does that. Many people can do that — but not all of them do it at the level of a Bowie or Duran Duran or Def Leppard.

Working with all these different musicians in the last few years, how have you yourself grown and evolved as a musician and as a creative? 

The older I get, the more I seem to know less. In my 20s, I remember saying to people, “I think I understand about 85% of music.” In my 30s, it was like 70% and my 40s were like 60%. Now in my 70s It feels like 3%. So a certain forced humility comes about, because you realize no one doesn’t know what they don’t know. [Laughs.] When that door opens to you — “Oh, holy mackerel.” Whatever arrogance was there starts to diminish. Humble is the first word that comes to me, and humility. 

As a musician, I’m always learning and practicing and writing, composing. Right before we got on the phone, I was finishing a piano part on [Bowie’s] “Wild is the Wind”; before that, “Five Years.” I’m still polishing my craft. Because as good as I am as a pianist, when you’re dealing with creativity, it’s infinite. So I might be good — but I can be better. The day that I lose that feeling is probably when I’m out of here. But I feel far from it now, because I’m starting to enjoy that portion of wisdom. That doesn’t mean I don’t still make mistakes — but it means that I’ve passed through some arrogant stupidity.

“A Bowie Celebration” is a livestream event on Jan. 8 at 9 p.m. ET/ 6 p.m. PT. Check out the full lineup and ticket information.

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Of course someone made a Game of Thrones cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency is . . . honestly, despite how often it’s in the news I still don’t fully understand it. It’s like money, but it’s . . . not as real? It’s theoretical currency that exists only in the digital realm, and sometimes you can trade it in for actual goods and services but oftentimes you can’t. It also depends on what kind of cryptocurrency you’re using. Like, you might be able to use Bitcoin to buy lunch at some insufferably trendy Brooklyn restaurant, but good luck going anywhere that accepts JRRToken, the “Lord of the Rings” cryptocurrency.

JRRToken is a really good name for a cryptocurrency, I’ll give it that. But that wasn’t enough to save it from the wrath of the J.R.R. Tolkien estate, which took it to court and eradicated it. If it ever gets big enough, something similar may happen to the Dracarys Dragon Token, a cryptocurrency trading on the popularity of “Game of Thrones” and its upcoming prequel series “House of the Dragon.”

There isn’t much to this crypto at the moment; there’s a Twitter account with a little over 100 followers and a Telegram account with over 500 members. I doubt it’s gotten big enough for HBO to have even heard of it, much less get a court order finding it in violation of their trademarks.

Still, anything can happen. Dogecoin is a cryptocurrency created with the explicit intention to mock the out-of-control speculative frenzy around cypto, and it ended up going for a rollercoaster ride on the stock market that resulted in real gains (and losses) for thousands of investors. Who knows what will happen with the the Dracarys Dragon Token, particularly when “House of the Dragon” premieres sometime next year?

The existential panic in “Don’t Look Up” is real. I see it in my clients

About one-third of the way into Adam McKay’s new film “Don’t Look Up,” there is a remarkable scene that takes place on the set of a vapid, “Good Morning America”-esque talk show. In this moment, the talking heads are lightly riffing, while a comet that will obliterate the Earth is en route to strike in six months — a fact that astronomy PhD candidate Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) and her professor, Dr. Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) are desperately trying to communicate. Dibiasky, appalled by the co-hosts’ inspid banter, interrupts and screams directly at the camera: “We’re all for sure 100% gonna f**kin’ die.”  

After Kate’s livid outburst, she is dismissed in short order: the hosts joke that she needs “media training”; Dr. Mindy attempts to lighten the situation by saying “maybe I should have given her that extra Xanax.” The world digs its heels in, happily avoiding paying attention to the terrified scientific community.

Critics love carping about how “Don’t Look Up” — a thinly-veiled satire of the climate crisis — fails to deliver in the comedy department. But I found this ominous cultural critique rather apropos. As a psychotherapist, art therapist, and steering committee member of Climate Psychology Alliance North America, I see the film as an intriguing Trojan Horse — a means of enlightening the masses about climate psychology through the guise of entertainment. 

But beyond that, there is something psychologically very apt about the film — in the characters’ reactions to the crisis precipitated by the comet, and in the fictional publics’ milquetoast reaction to the looming threat of extinction.

RELATED: Gangster capitalists and corrupt Republicans have a message for us: Don’t look up!

Anxious avoidance — a reflexive suppression of feelings — is one way in which we protect ourselves from confronting harsh truths. Laughing about celebrity gossip rather than thinking about impending death, as the public does in “Don’t Look Up,” is precisely what one would expect in this situation. Those with anxious avoidant behavior might squash down anything that pokes a hole in their preferred reality. Disavowal, or choosing to turn away from the climate emergency and focus on other things, is another form of avoidance.

I’ve seen this happen firsthand. During a California wildfire season several years ago, when the sky was dim and the air we breathed choked with smoke, haze, and particulates, I sat in my office chair preparing myself to meet with clients. The apocalypse out the window made my stomach hurt, but I was determined not to let any of my “stuff” enter the therapy room. I compartmentalized my feelings as best I could.

Other than an offhand comment about the inconvenience of the smoke, nary a client mentioned that wildfires were ravaging our state — something so blaringly obvious that the very air in the room reeked like a sour campfire. Surely, my clients had some feelings just as I did, and it affected them on various levels. But even in therapy, people find it difficult to acknowledge or express climate feelings that lurk deeply in the unconscious.

These days, I no longer compartmentalize the climate crisis in therapy sessions as I once did. My colleagues and I are learning to lead by example in the hopes of promoting a healthier response of engagement to our threatened “more-than-human-world.”

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I will say that in general, as a climate-aware therapist, there is a deafening silence on the issue of climate change amongst adults in the therapy room. While I’ve been contacted by clients coming into therapy with climate anxiety as their main issue, the bulk come in for other reasons: life transitions, family, work or school, relationships or pandemic stress. If anyone brings up the subject of climate change, 8 out of 10 times it’s a teenager.

Still, the topic of climate change seems to be affecting our mental health collectively on a deep level. More than 2/3 of Americans (67%) are somewhat or extremely anxious about the impact of climate change. A 2021 international study of young people ages 16-25 indicates that 84% are at least moderately worried about climate change.

But how often does the topic come up at the dinner table? Amongst friends and neighbors? And, if it does, how long does the conversation last? And might films like “Don’t Look Up” help with awareness?

In nearby communities directly impacted by wildfires, like Sonoma County, my colleagues are treating many more clients for climate-related mental health issues: PTSD, anxiety, depression, trauma.  And yet, a mere 40 miles away, in the Bay Area, there is an “out of sight, out of mind” mentality. If people don’t have to think about it, then they won’t. To some extent they might make individual choices that they believe absolve them from that responsibility (e.g. driving an electric vehicle) — a type of personal greenwashing.

If we stay absorbed in daily minutiae, refusing to acknowledge what is real, our outlook is bleak. Instead of linking arms to save the planet from a comet (or a 1.5 degree Celsius temperature increase), we Tweet and post and Like and Troll into cyber-oblivion. Not only are we the perpetrators of climate change on this planet, but we are also our worst enemy when it comes to doing anything about it. 

This tendency towards distracting ourselves to death is something that McKay’s fictional comedy absolutely nails. “Don’t Look Up” is a clever cultural mirror — conjuring the bodily stress response that many seek to avoid (tears, numbing, fast heartbeat, can’t look away, dread). This type of emotional disruption is critical if we care about the future of this world.

British Psychoanalyst and author Sally Weintrobe argues that “Exceptionalism” is largely responsible for the climate crisis. An exceptionalist, neoliberal mindset gained traction in the 1980’s, encouraging people to see themselves in idealized, all-deserving terms, vindicating them from both practical limits and morality. As a result, a culture of uncare and greed flourished — the fossil fuel industries and the housing crisis of 2008 are but two examples.

Indeed, as events of the film unfold, there is both a visceral disgust about the world we’ve created, as well as a gnawing sense of responsibility. The movie pulls a bait and switch, evolving from comedy to drama — but that’s entirely the point.

When climate communication is too scientific, too alarmist, too abstract, or too subtle, people check out. McKay is reaching a segment of the population that’s thinking: I’m slightly terrified about this, but I haven’t fully admitted it to myself or others and I’d rather downplay it and think about other things.

From a climate psychology perspective, this is a story of defense mechanisms: there’s President Orlean’s (Meryl Streep) disavowal of the topic of the impending comet strike. There’s Peter Isherwell (Mark Rylance playing a tech robber-baron amalgam), whose magical thinking and opportunism reveals itself as vapid denialism. Then, there’s the public itself, who are depicted as distracted, polarized, and easily herded. These are but a sample of the psychological complexity that we are up against in real life when we try to discuss existential crises like climate change.

Indeed, though it is distressing to think about ecological crises that threaten all of civilization, it is necessary to spur political action and stop us from killing the planet and ourselves.

Although the film offers a helpful (if dark) critique of American culture, it barely acknowledges what we know to be true about humanity during dark times. People resist and persist, they unite and grow stronger, and they force positive change. We have seen this before — from the Civil Rights movement to World War II Resistance to apartheid — and it is very much possible to spark a global climate movement.

Our best hope is multi-pronged: global-political determination, a new model of regeneration and a committed social movement. Hope lies in the power of the collective, of more voices chiming in, of civic action, forcing political, capitalist, and industry reckonings — only then the “Great Turning,” as Joanna Macy calls it, will come. Filmmaking, storytelling, art, and music, are powerful forms of creative expression — inviting and reminding us to look up.

Read more on talking through the climate crisis:

Donald Trump should be very afraid: This anniversary was not good news for him

Donald Trump must have awoken on the morning of Jan. 6 last year with a terrible sense of foreboding. It was the day his nemesis, Joe Biden, was scheduled to be certified as the winner of the presidential election. He had spent two whole months, November and December, trying to forestall what was going to happen that day. We now know from reporting on the period after the election that he didn’t do anything except play golf and talk to his outside lawyers, like Rudy Giuliani, and outside advisers, like Steve Bannon, about possible ways the results of the election could be overturned. 

He spoke with Bannon on Dec. 29 from Mar-a-Lago. Bannon told Trump he had to return from Florida and be present in Washington to prepare the ground for what they had planned for Jan. 6. This meant he would have to skip his big annual New Year’s Eve celebration at his club in Palm Springs, no small matter in the world of Donald Trump, who loves to be surrounded with adoring fans who have paid big money to be in his presence. But Bannon pushed him and pushed him hard. He had to work on Mike Pence. He had to pay attention to the memos written by another of his outside lawyers, John Eastman, laying out in two scenarios how Pence — who would preside over the joint session of Congress on Jan. 6 — could refuse to certify the electoral votes from battleground states and throw the election into the House of Representatives, where, as one memo delightedly declares, in all caps, “TRUMP WINS.”

Trump had been after Pence to help him overturn the election for weeks. On Jan. 5, he cornered Pence in the Oval Office and called Eastman, who was in the “war room” in the Willard Hotel across the street, and the two of them pressured Pence to refuse to certify enough electoral ballots from states like Arizona and Pennsylvania and Michigan such that neither Trump nor Biden, would have achieved the 270 electoral votes necessary to win. Supposedly, in that scenario, the ballots would be returned to the states where the Republican-led legislatures would convene and appoint new slates of electors and, again in all caps, “TRUMP WINS.” 

RELATED: Ex-Trump aide Peter Navarro says 100 House members were “ready” to carry out election coup

According to Bob Woodward and Robert Costa’s book “Peril,” which uncovered the Eastman memos and provides the bulk of the reporting on what transpired between Trump and Pence, the vice president demurred during that Jan. 5 Oval Office meeting with Trump. The next morning, Pence spoke to the conservative retired judge J. Michael Luttig, who had been Eastman’s boss in the Justice Department, about a letter he would release later that day. Following the legal advice of Luttig, as well as that of another conservative lawyer, John Yoo, Pence wrote that “my considered judgement [is] that my oath to support and defend the Constitution constrains me from claiming unilateral authority to determine which electoral votes should be counted and which should not.”

According to “Peril,” Pence remained at the vice president’s residence in the Naval Observatory on the morning of the 6th and did not go to the White House. Trump had begun tweeting veiled threats directed at Pence at 1 a.m. and continued at 8:17 a.m. with this: “All Mike Pence has to do is send them back to the States, AND WE WIN. Do it Mike, this is a time for extreme courage!” But Pence went straight from his home to the Capitol, leaving Trump in the Oval Office making his final preparations for the rally on the Ellipse, which he had advertised with a December tweet: “Be there. Will be wild!”

Woodward and Costa made a valedictory tour of the cable shows on Thursday, appearing on “Morning Joe” and later the same day on “The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell.” Woodward displayed his own copy of the Eastman memos on the air and referred several times to another sheaf of papers he described as a file of research from the office of Sen. Lindsey Graham that showed no evidence whatsoever of election fraud. Liz Cheney appeared on CNN, telling Jake Tapper: “‘The president of the United States is responsible for ensuring the laws are faithfully executed; he’s responsible for the security of the branches. So for the president to, either through his action or inaction, for example, attempt to impede or obstruct the counting of electoral votes, which is an official function of Congress, the committee is looking at that, whether what he did constitutes that kind of a crime.  But certainly it’s dereliction of duty.”

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Cheney has talked about possible crimes committed by Trump on or around Jan. 6 before, but it was Woodward’s appearance on MSNBC that really caught my attention. I’ve been a sort of Woodward tea-leaf reader since the Watergate days, throughout his various tomes on presidents as the years have passed. What has always amazed me about Woodward has been his almost congenital refusal to draw conclusions from the extensive reporting he’s done on presidents and their administrations. He’ll interview them and come up with extraordinary quotes and documentary evidence, but all he ever does is present it without comment. He has been called a “stenographer” for good reason, because of his reluctance or outright refusal to analyze or draw conclusions from some of the groundbreaking revelations he has reported over the years.

But not this week. Brandishing handfuls of documents and looking as animated as I’ve ever seen him, Woodward made repeated charges that what Trump had done in attempting to overthrow the election of 2020 was “a crime against the Constitution.” I’m not going to review my Woodward library on a quote-hunt, but I’m pretty sure it’s the first time I’ve ever heard him accuse a president or former president of a crime.

I’m dwelling on Woodward’s recent appearances on television for a reason. Ever since his famous work on Watergate, he has made a point of not reporting anything unless he’s confirmed it with multiple sources or has seen it written in a document he has in his possession. For that reason, Woodward has always known a lot more than he has written. He’s not necessarily withholding information from his readers, he is simply meticulous about what he feels he can report as true and what he can’t. In his appearances on television, he always seems beyond buttoned-up. He’s clearly a guy who’s not just careful about what he says, but obsessively so.

Not on the anniversary of Jan. 6. Bob Woodward looked like he was about to burst, holding out his sheafs of documents like they were tablets that had been passed down to him on a mountain. Woodward is reticent. He is careful. But he also reflects very accurately what the Washington establishment is thinking and talking about amongst themselves — the behind the scenes chatter of the “permanent government,” if you will.

Watching him on TV and reading my Bob Woodward tea leaves, it looked to me on Thursday that he has heard talk from friends and sources  amounting to more than rumor — that Trump is going to end up charged with a felony, or multiple felonies. He made clear that he thinks the House Jan. 6 committee is being thorough, almost to a fault, in the way they’re going about their investigation of the events before, during and after the day itself. Woodward is a Washington Whisperer par excellence. He’s been at it for almost 50 years. He is one of the least excitable guys I’ve ever met. But on Thursday, as he was being interviewed by Lawrence O’Donnell, he looked like he was about to levitate out of his chair.

That’s why for Donald Trump, Jan. 6 this year was even worse than Jan. 6 last year. As Richard Nixon discovered, when Bob Woodward says you’re in trouble, you’ve really got something to worry about.

Will the wheels of justice ever catch up with Donald Trump?:

“Dataraising” — when you’re asked to chip in with data instead of money

Fundraising appeals are part of everyday life, both online and off.

Requests for financial donations arrive by snail mail, email, social media and text messages. Cashiers at chain stores and supermarkets ask if you want to chip in for charitable causes. If you’re in the U.S., you might also be getting nearly constant texts asking you to contribute to political campaigns.

In my book “How We Give Now,” I explore how acts of giving extend beyond donating money to nonprofits, including an interesting trend on the rise that I call “dataraising.” It’s a term I coined while writing the book to describe nonprofits or researchers soliciting donations of data.

Perhaps surprisingly, dataraising is not entirely new. Medical research, for example, has long relied on volunteers to participate in clinical trials to gather enough data to study a disease.

The steps to participating in clinical trials – signing up, learning the protocols, agreeing to contribute your data – were developed to limit the harms that can follow when researchers just take people’s data. These protocols, imperfect as they are, distinguish informed data donations from the usual online data experience, in which companies’ terms of service afford them extensive claims to data while leaving individual users few choices and even less recourse.

There are apps for this

One reason for the growth in dataraising is that it is becoming easier to do for technological reasons.

For example, Apple launched Research Kit in 2015. It’s a set of software protocols that lets medical researchers design studies that use data directly from a person’s iPhone.

To participate in phone-based research, people download an app for a study. The best studies use consent processes that aren’t the usual legal forms with one of those “I agree” buttons at the end. Instead, these consent processes ask people to use their phone in ways that will generate only only the specific data researchers are collecting.

For example, the consent process for a study on Parkinson’s disease might ask you to swipe your fingers across the screen and then put the phone in your pocket and walk across the room. These actions generate data that shows signs of tremors in the hands and movement.

A 2021 industry study of mobile health apps counted more than 1,500 research projects based on digital health data with ResearchKit up to that point.

Android users can also participate in similar studies using Google’s Health Studies App, which launched in 2020.

Some apps are for the birds

But data donations facilitated by technology power more than just medical research.

Apps such as eBird, run by Cornell University’s Ornithology Lab, and iNaturalist, a collaboration between National Geographic and the California Academy of Sciences, rely on donations of cellphone photographs to power their biodiversity databases.

Civic science initiatives, also known as citizen science initiatives, assist with everything from water quality monitors to butterfly counts. These initiatives rely on contributed data, as do many genealogical websites.

Dataraising is also making it easier to document the history of specific communities.

For example, the Densho Archive, an online repository of historical artifacts related to the U.S. internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, contains donated photographs, letters and newspaper articles.

Other forces driving this trend

Legal changes, organizational innovation, social movements and increased attention to the harms of concentrated data are also playing a role in the spread of this practice.

In the United Kingdom, ride-share drivers can contribute their data to the Workers’ Info Exchange. Known as WIX, it uses the aggregated, analyzed information to protect workers’ rights and fight back against “robo-firing” – when companies design algorithms that automatically fire workers without any human involvement.

Organizations like WIX depend on people’s having access to their data, a right guaranteed by the European Union and in California through the California Consumer Privacy Act.

Helping solve vexing problems

As digital systems become more critical to everyday life, donated data can help answer more kinds of questions.

The consumer advocacy organization Consumer Reports is dataraising by collecting assorted cable TV bills. This data will help the group’s sleuths evaluate corporate claims about broadband speed, access and prices.

Mozilla, the nonprofit maker of the Firefox browser, has launched a browser plug-in called Rally. It makes it easy to share data over the internet with academic researchers.

And Kaiser Health News and National Public Radio have teamed up to conduct “Bill of the Month” investigations. Through this collaboration, the news outlets’ journalists are analyzing and reporting on the hidden fees and mysterious charges that are rife in the U.S. medical system.

When dataraising falters

The easier it gets to collect data from anyone, the more important it becomes to plan for troublemakers, provide people with tools to control their information, and make sure that participants treat one another with respect.

The iNaturalist app, for example, is used in a lot of classrooms, and students love to pull pranks, tagging their fellow classmates as bugs or snakes. Because it’s used globally, cultural and linguistic competence is key. What may seem lighthearted in one context can be deeply insulting elsewhere.

Digital data shared through online networks – especially those dedicated to public goods – require careful attention to protect participant safety. For example, people may want to donate data regarding how far they walked but not where they went. Although phone default settings may make it easiest to transmit location data and leave it up to researchers to calculate the distance traveled on foot, to make user safety a high priority, apps could calculate distance on the phone without transmitting someone’s location.

It’s also important to aspire to equitable access to people who want to donate their data for these purposes, which is hard since not everyone owns a smartphone. And I believe that those involved in these studies should meaningfully give consent that can be retracted at any time.

Over the years, participants in the civic science movement have created resources and manuals to promote good data governance and limit harassment of the people taking part in these efforts. Their goal is to enable equitable participation, make data security a priority and let individuals control their data. In some cases, protecting the identity of those who donate data is critical.

There are dedicated community managers and tiers of training for those who use iNaturalist, along with rules for the curators who manage its website, for example.

Voluntary practices like those are valuable. But in my view, the donation of data should be regulated. There are plenty of experts with professional and lived experience in online harms, data rights, community building and philanthropy to inform such efforts.

Lucy Bernholz, Senior Research Scholar of Philanthropy and Civil Society, Stanford University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

GOP Sen. Ron Johnson to seek reelection despite blowback over scientifically questionable claims

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) is reportedly going to seek a third term in office despite having low favorability ratings after months of scientifically illiterate comments about vaccines.

According to WISN 12 News’ Matt Smith, a Republican source claims that Johnson “will seek re-election and is expected to make his official announcement in the coming days.”

A November poll conducted by Marquette University Law School this past November showed that Johnson has just a 36 percent favorability rating among Wisconsin voters, which is significantly lower than both President Joe Biden and incumbent Democratic Gov. Tony Evers.

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Although Johnson has always had a reputation as a conservative Republican, in recent months he has been going more and more into the realm of conspiracy theories and has also cast doubt upon the safety of COVID-19 vaccines.

Just this week, for example, Johnson suggested it was blasphemous to rely upon vaccines to combat COVID-19 when God has given humans perfectly capable immune systems.

“Why do we think that we can create something better than God in terms of combatting disease?” the senator said. “There are certain things we have to do, but we have just made so many assumptions, and it’s all pointed toward everybody getting a vaccine.”

Learn more about Sen. Ron Johnson’s questionable scientific claims:

Behind Biden’s booming economy

With 2021’s year-end jobs numbers now fresh off the press, there’s been a lot of chatter about the economy’s “record” performance under President Biden, who was widely praised on Friday for jumpstarting the economy amid the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. 

“This was the greatest jobs growth year in modern American history,” tweeted Jesse Lee, Senior Advisor for Communications to the National Economic Council. “And it’s not even close.”  

“Without a single Republican vote, our Democratic Majorities in Congress and Pres. Biden rescued our economy,” echoed Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, “delivering the strongest 1st year economic performance of any Administration in 40+ years.”

RELATED: Better than expected jobs report shocks Fox’s Maria Bartiromo: “Wow, big beat!”

According to a Washington Post analysis, the U.S. gained back 6.4 million jobs throughout 2021 – more than any year on record. The nation also saw unemployment plummet from 6.7% last January, when Biden took office, to 3.9% this year – the biggest single-year drop in unemployment ever. In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicted that such a feat could not be achieved until 2026 at the earliest.

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Faced with these facts, it’s nearly impossible to conclude that Biden has put the economy in a worse position than it was a year ago. But throughout 2022, the mainstream media’s coverage of the jobs numbers peddled a markedly different perspective, often describing the year’s jobs reports as “weak” or “disappointing.” Even on Friday, as the administration touted record year-over-year growth, the business press largely insisted that December’s growth was, again, less-than-stellar. Fox News pilloried the Biden administration for numbers similar to those they praised under Trump. 

twitter.com/FoxNews/status/1026087424177434626

What gives? Well, a large part of it has to do with the way jobs numbers are reported. On the first Friday of every month, the Department of Labor releases a report of the previous month’s performance metrics, including job growth, wage growth, and unemployment. However, these numbers are intermittently revised throughout the following weeks. As MSNBC’s Steve Benen noted, in June, “the preliminary tally under-reported the jobs totals by 112,000. A month later, the initial total under-reported 148,000 jobs. The month after that, it was 248,000 jobs.”

RELATED: GOP governors who ended unemployment benefits failed to spur job growth, September numbers suggest

Unfortunately, this nuance was lost in much of the mainstream media’s coverage, which this year framed preliminary tallies as de facto bellwethers for Biden’s economic recovery. If you’ll remember, during the months of August, September, November, and December, U.S. jobs numbers were broadly panned by the press, even though there were significant revisions later on. For example, September’s initial count showed 194,000 jobs added, the Post noted. A month later, this number was 312,000. 

“Since 1979, the furthest back that Bureau of Labor Statistics data on revisions goes, the country has never added as many jobs in a year or seen such a large upward revision,” the Post’s Philip Bump wrote. “Revisions are usually modest. Not this year.”

Though the number of upward jobs revisions this year was unprecedented, the mainstream media paid them relatively little attention throughout 2021. It’s no surprise, then, that Biden’s approval rating dropped about 10% mid-year, especially when the plurality of Americans rate the economy as the most important issue. 

RELATED: How the business lobby created the “labor shortage” myth — and GOP used it to slash benefits

Though Biden’s recovery has been impressive, the road to recovery remains long and windy, especially as the COVID crisis proves increasingly unwieldy. Roughly 9.4 million jobs were lost in 2020, meaning that the market is still down by about 3.6 million jobs from pre-pandemic levels.

To boot, Federal Reserve officials remain concerned about inflation amid the supply chain crisis ushered in by the pandemic. Back in November, the Post reported that prices had risen 6.2% in 2021. Because hourly earnings increased by only 5.1%, this means that real gains (i.e. wages adjusted for inflation) were actually down by 1.1%. 

Still, as the Great Resignation carries on, and workers leave their jobs in droves, employees are reportedly finding themselves with increasing leverage, prompting companies to rethink their payroll provisions coming into 2022.

MAGA rioter could be headed back to jail after telling CNN he’d storm Capitol again

Earlier this week, Jan. 6 insurrectionist Josh Pruitt appeared on CNN and indicated he would storm the Capitol again.

Now, federal prosecutors are seeking to revoke Pruitt’s pretrial release and lock him up, pointing to his nationally televised statements, as well as numerous curfew violations and threats he’s allegedly made against his ex-girlfriend and others.

Pruitt, a member of the Proud Boys who was living in DC at the time of the insurrection, has a long rap sheet, including 19 prior arrests and eight convictions, WUSA Channel 9 reported Friday.

In fact, Pruitt was on probation and wearing an ankle monitor when he stormed the Capitol, where he fought with police and was seen on surveillance video throwing a “Quiet Please” sign across the atrium. He was arrested later that night for violating curfew in DC, but subsequently released under “a high-intensity supervision program” after being charged in the insurrection.

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“According to a brief filed Thursday by the Justice Department, Pruitt has violated those conditions multiple times,” WUSA reported.

While on pretrial release, Pruitt was sentenced to another term of probation for violating two civil protection orders.

“According to the DOJ, in a victim impact statement in that case, Pruitt’s former girlfriend described fear that Pruitt would hit her and receiving a ‘barrage’ of text messages and video clips, including threats, ‘some of which depict Pruitt playing with a knife or standing outside her apartment building,'” the station reported.

In addition to his ex-girlfriend, Pruitt has allegedly been threatening others on social media.

RELATED: Trump’s former spokesperson reveals that he was “gleefully” rewinding Capitol riot footage on Jan. 6

“In various messages, Pruitt allegedly threatened to put someone ‘six feet under’ and said in another, in reference to the rounds in a Glock-19, that, ‘I have 30 friends waiting for you.’ In still another message, prosecutors say, he warned, ‘[Expletive] around and watch your pulse disappear princess.'”

Earlier this week, pretrial services officials filed a report alleging Pruitt had recently committed seven new curfew violations.

Two lawyers arguing against virus safety measures before Supreme Court get COVID

At least two of the state officials arguing against the Biden Administration’s federal vaccine mandates Friday were forced to appear in front of the Supreme Court remotely because they had contracted COVID over the last few days, reports said.

Ohio Solicitor General Benjamin Flowers and Louisiana Solicitor General Liz Murrill argued their case over the phone, on behalf of Republican state officials and business groups who are seeking to block two Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) vaccine requirements: one for employers who employ more than 100 people and another for healthcare facilities of any size.

Other attorneys who passed the Supreme Court’s strict COVID-19 guidelines were able to appear in front of the court, which had just eight members present, Reuters reported. Justice Sonia Sotomayor participated in the hearings remotely from her chambers, a spokesperson for the court confirmed. 

Everyone present had to present a negative PCR test taken at a court-approved facility before entrance, and wear an N95 or KN95 mask while inside. The public, normally allowed to attend oral arguments, is also barred from entering the building.

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Many public health professionals pointed out the irony of Friday’s proceedings: The protocols being followed by attendees are far more stringent than the ones required by the Biden Administration — and have so far worked to prevent an outbreak.

“Now, meeting in a safe, controlled environment, the justices may well block OSHA’s requirements that employers protect workers from exposure to a deadly virus,” epidemiologist David Michaels wrote for the Washington Post this week. “This irony illustrates a fundamental inequity that is so normalized it is essentially invisible: Powerful people can choose to work safely, while vulnerable workers must continue to risk their lives to make a living.”

The court has not yet announced a decision on either of Biden’s COVID safety rules, though reports suggest the conservative majority is likely to reject the Administration’s rules pertaining to large employers. It’s less clear what they will decide on the separate vaccine mandate for healthcare facilities — at least some of the justices appeared more open to this rule than the first, according to CNN.

Read more stories like this:

Why “The Wheel of Time” succeeds as an adaptation (and “The Witcher” fails)

Not all adaptations are created equal. For every “Game of Thrones,” which translated its source material fairly faithfully (until it ran out), there are legions of adaptations like “The Golden Compass” or “The Legend of Earthsea,” where the soul of the original work has been sucked out, not to mention groan-worthy cash grabs like “The Hobbit” trilogy.

Since the success of HBO’s fantasy phenomenon, we’ve seen a swell of companies adapting fantasy and science fiction stories that they might never have had the daring to before. At the end of 2021, two big ones dominated the conversation: Amazon’s “The Wheel of Time,” based on the 15-book series by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson; and the second season of Netflix’s “The Witcher,” based on the bestselling short stories and novels by Andrzej Sapkowski. While both adaptations include large changes from their respective source books, one managed it far more successfully. We’re here today to discuss why.

A note before we begin: Opinions and tastes are subjective, especially with reviews like this. Both of these shows have done things that some fans have liked and others have loathed. I’m not here to try and convince you that you should or shouldn’t like a show; enjoy what you enjoy. What I am going to do is dissect how these shows are in conversation with their source material.

With that out of the way, let’s talk about why “The Wheel of Time” succeeds as an adaptation while “The Witche”r fails. Of course, you should be warned that there will be SPOILERS for both shows as well as their respective book series below

Who is the Dragon Reborn?

Let’s start with “The Wheel of Time.” This is the tale of a group of young people who are whisked away from their sleepy village by a sorceress and her steely-eyed bodyguard; as you can tell, it starts out about as familiar as fantasy stories get. As we already started to find out this season, things grow more interesting the farther you get into the story, but at the start, “The Wheel of Time” might not feel like it’s reinventing the wheel much.

But how does the show stack up as an adaptation? There were some major changes made in the first season, including the cutting of locations and characters, several deaths, compressing storylines, and at least one major plot deviation that was likely the result of main cast member Barney Harris having to leave the production. In short, it felt like “The Wheel of Time” had to make some really difficult choices to adapt a basically unadaptable story. Was I sad to not see the city of Caemlyn this season? Sure. But it also made sense that the show could only go to so many locations in eight episodes and needed to focus on the ones it could get the most use out of. For instance, many of the events that happen in Caemlyn in the first book happen in Tar Valon on the show, Tar Valon being a city the story returns to again and again. Why not save some money and build a set you know you’ll be using for the long haul?

The inclusion of plotlines from other books, like the Aes Sedai politicking or Moiraine and Siuan’s romance, also served the story well. “The Wheel of Time” feels like an adaptation of the series as a whole, not a book-by-book thing. Which was always going to be the case, right? Showrunner Rafe Judkins has gone on record as saying that he hopes the show can last for around eight or so seasons. There are 15 books, including a prequel revolving around Moiraine. We were never going to see a one-to-one adaptation of this story; for logistical reasons, it’s just not possible.

On the flip side, what changes the show is making mostly feel like they are coming from the source material in some way or another. Moiraine and Siuan’s romance is a great example. This is book canon, but held very much in the background of the prequel novel “New Spring.” Judkins and his team took those “kernels” that Robert Jordan peppered throughout his series and blew them up to make more meaningful story arcs. For the most part, it really feels like that worked.

That’s not to say there weren’t hiccups. There were changes in the season finale I didn’t love, like separating the team for the journey into the Blight and cutting out two of the Forsaken. But again, they were mostly understandable since the show is playing up the ensemble nature of the story. The first book, “The Eye of the World,” focuses extremely heavily on Rand’s point of view, while the rest of the series is told from many perspectives. The show made the conscious decision to be an ensemble piece from the get-go, to give viewers a more honest idea of what to expect from the show overall.

In conclusion, it feels an awful lot like the changes and choices made by “The Wheel of Time” team were done with a lot of care and reverence for the source material. There was never a feeling that they were changing things for the hell of it, but because they were doing the best they could with the medium in which they were working.

Sometimes, the changes even ended up working out better for the story, as with the mystery over who the Dragon Reborn was. This was something the show played way up, and it worked really well. In the books it’s far more obvious that it’s Rand, since we spent more time with him. Here, first-time viewers could plausibly be in suspense.

There’s still a sense that “The Wheel of Time” is finding its footing . . . but to my mind it has never been a question that the show is trying really hard to do its best by Robert Jordan’s story.

Who needs the books?

Then we have “The Witcher.” The easiest way I can think to describe what “The Witcher” did with its second season is that it looked at the book, shrugged, said “meh, we can do it better,” and then tossed the damn thing out the window.

It did not do it better.

Just like “The Wheel of Time,” there were plenty of changes made here that were pretty understandable. Many fans have been upset that the Nilfgaardian Emperor Emhyr var Emries (aka the White Flame) was revealed to be Ciri’s father in the season finale . . . something we don’t learn until literally the end of the final book of the series. But as jarring as that might be for book fans, it’s something that makes total sense for the show to do because in the novels the reveal hinges on different people calling Emhyr different names. When you finally realize who he is it’s only because Geralt calls him a name he once used in his past. It’s a great example of an author capitalizing on the unique strengths of the written medium, but that won’t work in a television show because we see the guy’s face. Think of what “Game of Thrones” did with Barristan Selmy / Arstan Whitebeard; you just can’t hide a person’s identity onscreen in the same way you can in a book.

Conversely, there are ways that a reveal can be more effective onscreen than it can on the page; I think “The Witcher” is pulling off the reveal of Rience and Lydia’s employer quite well.

So what’s my problem with “The Witcher”? Well, the biggest is that the show basically sidestepped most of the novel on which it’s based, “Blood of Elves.” You remember that cool Kaer Morhen set we spent so much time in? It’s only in one chapter of the entire novel. The rest sees Geralt and Ciri journeying across the land, before Ciri separates to train with Yennefer and Geralt attempts to stop nefarious forces from pursuing his adopted daughter.

This wouldn’t be so much of an issue, if it wasn’t for the fact that the show downplayed some of the novel’s most important parts, or didn’t even get to others. For instance, the Redanian city of Oxenfurt is a huge part of “Blood of Elves.” It’s a cultural center for the Continent. It’s home to the Academy, which trains everyone from bards to scholars to advisors to kings and queens. Geralt meets Djikstra and Philippa Eilhart there; he’s also ambushed by the Michelet Brothers in a scene that is very clearly meant to show that humans can be just as dangerous to him as monsters. Sure, it was hinted that the meeting with Djikstra will happen next season, but by then they’ll also need to have a very different encounter which happens at the end of the next book, “The Time of Contempt.” The relationship between those characters is now fundamentally changed, and Oxenfurt was relegated to a stereotypical medieval city with no worldbuilding whatsoever.

It’s kind of baffling that “Blood of Elves” is a relatively short and straightforward book, yet the show managed to not even cover all of it, to leave out huge chunks and outright disregard others. It would be understandable if the show ran out of space, but the issue was that it chose to tell a ton of other stories instead. That entire Baba Yaga plotline with Yennefer? Not in the books. The monoliths? Not in the books. It’s safe to say that most scenes you can think of from the season are not in the books at all, and what few are have been so boiled down that all the tension is sucked out of them. It’s very clear that the show prioritized its own ideas over anything Andrzej Sapkowski laid out in his novels, which stands in stark contrast to “The Wheel of Time,” where many changes were at least still rooted in Robert Jordan’s work.

There is a reason for this, of course, and it’s one that “The Witcher” showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich has spoken openly about: the writers believed “Blood of Elves“ to be too slow for television audiences to stomach. They’d lose interest, so the choice was made to liven things up by adding in extra plotlines and action sequences. The irony is that what parts of “Blood of Elves” the show adapted were done so carelessly and without regard for what made them interesting in the first place that I almost believe it. (The sole exception being Rience’s interrogation of Jaskier.) And so we got the story we got in the show, which feels more like fanfic than an actual adaptation.

The straw that broke The Witcher’s back

The place where “The Witcher” really runs into problems is when it does things that outright undermine its source material. This was more of a problem last season and in “Nightmare of the Wolf,” but its effects linger. In “Nightmare,” certain witchers are creating monsters in order to keep their coffers filled. In the novels, this is a rumor that is spread about witchers, which leads a group of opportunistic sorcerers to bring a mob of villagers to the keep with torches and pitchforks. The whole point of this plot is to show how irrational fears of the other can lead to irrational violence (a huge theme of the novels). Instead, the film justified the pogrom.

Nilfgaard is another pretty clear example where “The Witcher” has tripped up. In Andrzej Sapkowski’s novels, the empire is an economic powerhouse. They conquer countries and then bolster their economy and give them better infrastructure. It makes the whole expansion of the empire an extremely complicated issue. Contrast that with the show’s depiction of Nilfgaardians as religious zealots, vastly simplifying their ideals to the point where they are unrecognizable and utterly unsympathetic. The show took a complex issue and dumbed it down to the point where it no longer forces viewers to think critically about the complexities of the story. The same can be said of Francesca’s baby-vengeance plotline. In the novels, the elves work with Nilfgaard because they are promised the return of their ancestral home, Dol Blathanna. This is touched on in the show, but is undermined by the baby plotline.

I could go on and on; the show is littered with this stuff. Eskel and Lambert’s personalities are swapped for no discernible reason, Jaskier slut-shames Yennefer in the first season while his book counterpart defends her from slut-shaming in the exact same scene.

Suffice it to say, for all the stylistic and aesthetic things “The Witcher” does right, it really drops the ball when it comes to interpreting its source material.

It’s not all bad news

I’ve spent quite a bit of time ragging on “The Witcher,” but I’d be remiss not to mention some things that the show is doing right. Henry Cavill’s portrayal of Geralt of Rivia has been nothing short of perfect. Triss Merigold has a much stronger plotline, and actor Anna Shaffer has really grown into the role. The introduction of the monoliths and the multiple worlds, while a bit frustrating for how much time it took up this season, does make sense. The multiversal aspect of “The Witcher” novels comes a bit out of left field in the books even though it’s a major plot element for the back half of the series. It’s to the show’s credit that it’s setting it up earlier. And of course, the costuming, monster design and special effects are really stepped up this year. There’s no denying that “The Witcher’s” second season is a huge improvement over the first.

While “The Wheel of Time” has an extremely challenging task adapting a gargantuan book series, “The Witcher” has a similarly unique challenge in appeasing multiple fandoms. “The Witcher” books have many fans the world over, but the wildly popular video game adaptation by CD Projekt Red is equally (if not more) well-loved. I can’t imagine it’s an easy task to try to please not one but two rabid fanbases with different ideas of what the story should look like. The controversy surrounding the death of Eskel is a perfect example. He’s hardly in the books but a fixture of the game series, so to my eye it seems the vast majority of the people getting upset about it are the gamers. I don’t agree with how the show handled that, or the reasoning for why it had to be Eskel who died, but I’m sympathetic to the writers who need to untangle these thorny issues.

“The Wheel of Time” vs. “The Witcher” — Which is a better adaptation?

In conclusion, it feels like the producers behind “The Wheel of Time” made difficult choices to adapt a borderline unadaptable story; hiccups and all, their passion for the source material is obvious. “The Witcher,” on the other hand, feels like a show at war with itself . . . a war where the only loser is the novels.

There are still many seasons to come for these shows, and reasons to be optimistic for both . . . but for my money, “The Wheel of Time” is doing a much better job of honoring its source material.

Supreme Court hearing grows tense as Justice Kagan grills lawyer challenging Biden’s vaccine mandate

Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan grilled an attorney on Friday who was seeking to overturn President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for workers.

Representing the National Federation of Independent Business, Washington lawyer Scott A. Keller argued against Biden’s vaccine or test program administered through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

“Mr. Keller, I guess I just don’t see as a situation — you know, a typical arbitrary, capricious situation where we say ‘Oh, you didn’t consider an alternative carefully enough.’ We all know what the best policy is. By this point, two years later, we know that the best way to prevent spread is to get vaccinated. And to prevent dangerous illness and death, is for people to get vaccinated. That is by far the best.”

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“The second best is to wear masks. And so this is a policy that says ‘we are still confronting thousands of people dying every time we look around and so we are going to put into place the policy we know works best, which is to strongly incentivize vaccination and insist that unvaccinated people will wear masks and test,” she explained.

“Why isn’t that necessary? What else should be done? It is obviously the policy geared towards preventing the most sickness and death and the agency has done everything but stand on its head to show, quite clearly, that no other policy will prevent sickness and death to anywhere like the degree this one will,” she said.

Watch the full exchange below:

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