The Nightmare is over. The nightmare is not over. It's OK to celebrate a little.

 The nightmare is over. The nightmare is not over. It's OK to celebrate a little before getting back into the work of it. Things do not automatically go back to 2016, but still.

I made this playlist of music that makes me happy. Be happy for a bit before we get to the next part.

On Trump-Biden Debate 1, and Donald Trump's Covid 19 Diagnosis...

If you've been listening to the podcast I've been doing, you know some of my positions on US politics. I have opinions, y'all! 

So far, my favorite take on Trump's Covid diagnosis has got to be Jake Tapper from CNN.

CNN’s @jaketapper: “Sick and in isolation, Mr. President, you have become a symbol of your own failures. Failures of recklessness, ignorance, arrogance. The same failures you have been inflicting on the rest of us ... Get well and get it together" #CNNSOTU pic.twitter.com/XXA5uC91Ea

— State of the Union (@CNNSotu) October 4, 2020

"You have become a symbol of your own failure. Get well, and get it together."

I have a feeling few minds are actually changed by these videos (before the videos, it was webcomics, and/or SNS text blocks) where one side of one of our culture wars has their position crystallized into a concise, clear expression. I understand that the function of viral clips like this is probably mostly just preaching to the choir so that they can nod along, pound the desk, shout "Heck yeah!" and feel right about their position. I even know that pickling in self-reinforcing content exacerbates the echo chamber/information silo effect and makes it harder for dialogue to happen across political alignments. I know all that, but still... that was well put. 

If Mr. Tapper wasn't enough for you, I also made a thing that I'd like to share.

If you would like to know my thoughts about Donald Trump's performance at the September 29, 2020 presidential debate (jackass trying but failing to score a knockout punch, so combining the worst traits of a drunk uncle and a hyper toddler instead...but for understandable reasons, given who we're dealing with), the conceit that debates are supposed to persuade undecided voters (4:50), the thing we learn from his behavior by reading between the lines (7:24), his subsequent Covid 19 diagnosis (8:52) (so frustrating that there is so little good faith or trust that even a White House health bulletin has people asking 'What's the angle here') what some of those angles might be (9:23 and 11:20), the way this distracts from what we should be talking about right now (10:27), the tough guy image Trump's cultivated (12:04), whether Trump even could pull off a con like a fake Covid infection (13:10), or the people gloating (14:30) or wishing Trump ill online (14:58) and how that plays into what happens to Trumpism next... go ahead and watch this!

And... if all that political stuff was too much, here's a video of a street performance that I keep coming back to.

Take care of yourselves, dear readers.

Coronavirus CoVideo Corner: Rob interviewed by Rob

A fellow in the UK has started a Youtube series during his Covid 19 stay-at-home quarantine, and by sheer coincidence, he came up with the same name for his series as I made for my plague film series!

His name is Rob, just like mine, so naturally I agreed to be interviewed for his YouTube channel.

I'm fond of his channel and quite enjoyed this interview, so everybody, please check it out!

CoronaVirus CoVidEo Corner: Plague Film Bonanza: Part 4

To Recap:

Weirdo that I am, I'm commemorating the CoVid19 lockdown by watching plague movies, and because I love you, dear reader, I'm writing them up for you, and I'll end the series with a nice best-of countdown!

If you aren't up to date on the series, the rules for inclusion or need a full description of the scoring, or you want links to the other installments in the series, I'll put a recap at the bottom of this post, or you can read the full description, the official rules, and find links to every part of the series on the table of contents page linked here.

Scoring:
Films that fail to hold my attention get a DNF (Did Not Finish) and no score (that would be unfair).

Films that hold my attention are scored on four dimensions:
Frightening (Is it the kind of scary that builds up, and stays with you afterward?) Dread & anxiety get points here.
Scary (Is it the kind of scary that makes you jump in your seat, or wish you'd eaten a smaller lunch?) Surprises and gross-outs get points here.
Plausible (Does the plague, and people's response to it, seem realistic, as if it could possibly happen?)
Awesome (Is it a good movie? Does it hit its marks?)
Each of these dimensions will be scored out of five.
Finally, for bonus demerits/points:
"But wait, there's more!" stinger (Does the film end by hinting that the infection is on its way to a sequel new location?) That's tacky, and I take away points depending on the amount of cheesiness.

Coming Up in this Review: 
Antiviral (2012)
Maggie (2015)
10 Cloverfield Lane (2016)
Pandemic (2016)
Stephen King's The Stand (1994)
28 Days Later (2002) / 28 Weeks Later (2007) duology
The Invasion (2007)



Spoilers for every film, by the way.

What's After Lockdown? Imagining a New Post-Covid19 Lockdown Normal

Roboseyo! Are you blogging again?

Here's the thing I wrote about how South Korea flattened the curve.


USA just had 3.2 million people file for unemployment in a week. USA also just blew past China to take the world lead in Covid 19/ ChinaVirus TrumpVirus infections.

Meanwhile, US politicians are starting to float the idea that maybe a few hundred thousand deaths is just the price you have to pay to keep the economy chugging. (Seriously, fuck those guys.) That idea -- the "herd immunity" idea Boris Johnson floated in the UK is inhumane, and anybody who promotes it should have to pick which 20% of their parents (or beloved elderly relatives, friends or mentors over 70) "gets" to die to save the economy, and then sit at their bedsides.

THIS IS YOUR FUCKING PLAN? Holy shit I'm mad.

But... something's gotta give, right? You can't just lock down for eighteen months.