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By Victoria Rolfe COVID -19 has brought about many changes to our world, and fear of it has prompted a range of reactions that make us rethink our lives. One of those gut reactions is to flee. This is understandable, especially if you are living in a highly populated area. That density of personal contact can leave you feeling very vulnerable and exposed right now. It’s only natural to want to get away. Thus, we are now seeing a mass exodus of people moving out of the cities and into the suburbs and rural areas surrounding them. We certainly have seen it here in the Hudson Valley where I live, 100 miles from New York City. And right away, my budget counselor mind kicks in. I worry a little when someone makes any kind of snap emotional decision to spend a large chunk of money, and it is especially worrisome in this uncertain economic time we find ourselves in. So I put together these guidelines to help anyone who is contemplating making that big leap from renting to ownership (be it a house, condo, coop or apartment) to make an informed, financially sound decision. How do you know when you are ready to buy a house? Well, some people think it’s just a matter of saving that down payment, but really a lot more preparedness needs to go into it. First of all, how settled are you? Many young people move around quite a lot for job changes or other purposes, so even if they are very lucky enough to have that down payment at such a young age, it is not necessarily the best time to be putting down roots with home ownership. Unless you are sure that you will be staying put for at least the next five years, buying a house is rarely a smart move financially. You will sink a lot of money into the act of buying the house, such as closing costs, realtor fees, inspections and lawyer’s fees. Once you buy, there is the cost of moving in. Often on top of that, people will do some work to the house to make it more to their liking. And there is even the inevitable furnishing and decorating, especially if you are starting from scratch with nothing. If you have put down a small down payment, you will typically not be gaining much equity in the house for the first few years at least, as most of these initial payments go towards to the interest on the mortgage. It is not until the principal starts to go down a little that the mortgage payments will start to chip away at it. And of course it also depends on the housing market. It could go down in value and put you in a situation of being “upside down” on your mortgage. That is actually owing more on it than the house is worth. This is what happened to all those people when the housing bubble burst in 2008. Remember, then, it will take a while before you will get enough principal back when you sell to offset the costs you put in when buying. If you sell too soon, you will not only not gain any money on the sale, you will come out in the hole for your years of home ownership. Next, other than that down payment you have saved up, how is your financial situation? Do you have any debt? If you do, it is very smart to pay it off before embarking on your homeownership journey. Do you have an emergency fund of three to six month’s expenses set aside? I would recommend at least six months of savings during this transition into home ownership, as you never know what will happen. Is your job secure? You don’t want to take on all of these extra monthly expenses only to be caught high and dry, with a loss of income. This type of scenario sends people scrambling and can result in a disastrous situation. Even if your job is secure, you have a good down payment saved up and you know you will be staying put, have you crunched the numbers to see of you can afford the cost of homeownership? A common mistake people make is this line of thinking. “I am paying X (say $1,500 per month) on my rent so I might as well be paying that amount towards a mortgage and actually owning my own home.” The trouble with that is that you must consider all the other costs of ownership. Some things that were covered by your landlord before are now your responsibility. Have you thought about taxes, homeowner’s insurance, electricity, heat, TV, Internet, water, and rubbish removal? In addition to all of these fixed expenses, if the house is yours, you are now responsible for the upkeep. And no matter what great shape that house was in when you bought it, something always needs attention. Sometimes it seems barely a month goes by without an unexpected household expense. Even non-household expenses can derail you if you are living on the edge, just making your monthly bills without a penny to spare. This is why it is so important to have that emergency fund set up before you move in. Now what about that down payment? If you put down less than a 20% down payment, then you have to pay PMI. And although you are responsible for these premiums, this insurance does nothing to protect you. It is to protect the bank from losing the money they lent you should you default on your payments. So, this brings us to a common question. How much of a down payment should you put down and how do you save up that kind of money? The answer to the first question is as much as possible, at the very least 20% (to avoid Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI). If it’s home ownership you are after, and not living in a bank-owned house that you are paying dearly for in interest payments, you should set your sights on the biggest chunk of money you can plop down. Another way to keep your down payment at a higher percentage of the cost of the house is to buy a less expensive house. This way, that same down payment you have saved is now a larger percent of the total cost. Here’s a dirty little secret the banks don’t want you to know. They will approve you for a mortgage that is really out of a comfortable price range for you. Why? Because they are really not interested in how comfortable you are making the payments. They are just looking to get the biggest mortgage for themselves: the more you borrow, the more interest payments they will get. So buy a house that you are comfortable with, monthly payment wise, not what the bank approves you for. Ideally this payment should be no more that 25% of your monthly income. And one more thing on the subject of mortgages. The bank will automatically default to a 30-year-mortgage, but you are much better off getting a 15-year one. The more quickly you can get that house paid off, the less total interest you will pay on it. You can save yourself many thousands of dollars--even hundreds of thousands--by just doing this one thing.. And how does one save up for that mortgage? The same way I recommend you save up for anything else. Make it automatic! Open up an online account and set up automatic monthly payments going into it. Take the total amount you want to save and divide it by the months until you want to have the money. If you want to save up a $75,000 down payment in four years, that would mean you need to save about $1,500 per month If your timeline for savings is actually more than five years, then you might want to consider investing part or all of the money into a low-cost, relatively safe mutual fund, such as an S&P 500. Putting those payments away each month will also help you to live below your income and able to make all those extra expenses when you do move into that house. Owning your own home is the American Dream, but please make sure you are fully ready for it before taking the plunge. Otherwise, it has the potential of turning into a nightmare! Best of luck to you if you are embarking on this exciting new chapter of your life. Wishing you a bright future in your Home Sweet Home! Victoria Rolfe is a family budget coach who has had a lifetime of experience in the art and joy of frugal living and its resulting financial freedom. She spent many years as a stay-at-home mom and home economist and rose successfully to the challenge of raising a family of four kids on a modest income without incurring debt. She did crazy things like paying for all their cars with cash, paying off their mortgage in ten years, buying their next house for cash, and sending all her kids to college with no student loans, while building a comfortable retirement nest egg for their own bright future. She is now passionate about helping others to enter this beautiful world of peaceful and simple frugality and to achieve their own financial goals with the knowledge and personal finance skills that she has acquired. She writes a monthly blog, teaches via a series of light-hearted group presentations that she created, and sees clients in one-on-one personal meetings. Visit her website and blog at brightfuture2budget4.weebly.com, or email her at brightfuture2budget4@gmail.com.

By Anita Saesing Let’s get this out of the way: I am a stereotypical millennial—26 years old, to be exact. I believe in fulfillment and happiness over job security. I have the Internet at my fingertips, so I’m constantly learning. I love gluten-free avocado toast, brunch, and social outings. Last but not least, whether I love it or not, Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat are major influences in my life. Let’s take it a step further. Being raised by decidedly non-millennial parents was challenging. I grew up in a working-class family, with an immigrant mother from Laos who told me to bury my passions and interests, especially if I couldn’t make a living off them. So things like writing and traveling were for people who were either born wealthy or were lost in life. My mother believed work should be my North Star; I should find fulfillment and identity in a high-paying career. What I heard was, “After I work my butt off for years, competing with Boomers, Gen Xers and Gen Yers, I will hopefully get the opportunity to be responsible for motivating and ensuring results from a team of people.” I saw what my HR bosses went through, and honestly, I didn’t think they got paid enough to handle all of that stress. Every manager or supervisor I had told me how replaceable employees were, and how they themselves feared they would be replaced by someone younger and sharper. My last supervisor told me, “If I die tomorrow, a company will hire my replacement before the ink dries on my obituary.” That notion didn’t sit well with me. A person could give a company years of hard work and still be furloughed, laid off, or replaced. Needless to say, my mother’s dream for me terrified me. I am a whole human being, a sum of my experiences. I’m not just an employee. As if something in the universe called out to me, I left my HR job last July and decided to take a gap year. My first four months were spent in North America. I flew cross-country twice visiting family and friends, and even ventured across the Pacific Ocean to the hospitable island of Kauai. These memories are imprinted in my mind: all of the love and laughter that comes forth among selfless people. Within these four months, my childhood friend and I agreed to reunite outside of the United States. We flew into Alberta, Canada. Photos on Instagram and Pinterest did not do it justice. I thought the images of the lakes were edited, but they legitimately are a vibrant blue color due to the sediment and rock flour in the water. I was in absolute awe of Alberta’s natural beauty. It truly is a utopia for nature lovers, adventurers, and wanderers yearning for serenity. Despite the lack of sleep, I fell in love with all aspects of traveling, even staying in airports. I enjoyed waiting for my boarding group to be called, running towards baggage claim for my luggage, meeting new people and so on. Among my many trips in 2019, I would say my favorite trip has to be Spain. I was mesmerized by the Spanish culture—the dancing, the local dishes, the general disposition of the citizens. I had studied Spanish in high school and was able to converse with some locals. I didn’t want the trip to end, so I took another plane from Barcelona to Madrid and explored the surrounding cities. My boyfriend joked that I was never coming home. Could you blame me? I finally got a taste of freedom. When I returned to the U.S., I visited two more cities before enrolling in an Italian class. My goal was to visit Italy in the summer of 2020, a grand finale to my gap year. Then COVID-19 happened, and all of my travel plans were derailed. I was sitting in my class listening to my peers discuss how Italy was the epicenter of the pandemic. We didn’t think much about coronavirus, because the U.S. wasn’t actively testing yet. We said our goodbyes before spring break. Who would have guessed that it would be the last time we physically saw each other? Jet-setting to Meal Planning Self-isolation has been hell, especially here in Arizona. Ask any Arizonian, and we’ll all say a dry heat at 120 degrees still sucks, so don’t hit us with that “at least there’s no humidity” line. The summer weather limited our outdoor times to early mornings and late evenings. On top of that, my boyfriend and I made the decision in March to self-isolate. My boyfriend is risk-adverse and has an all-or-nothing mindset. This meant cooking all of our meals at home (so no takeout or delivery), contactless curbside pickup, and no social outings. My iPhone was my lifeline. Besides communicating with my friends and scrolling through travel Instagram posts, I became obsessed with COVID-19 articles. I tried watching Netflix, but it was mostly background noise. As the weeks turned into months, I watched my friends give up on social distancing. Two-thirds of my friends aren’t parents, so they didn’t feel obligated to stay home. They were traveling and renting Airbnbs. They posted their adventures all over social media. I knew scientifically that contracting COVID-19 was dangerous, but I grew resentful of staying indoors. I was in a constant state of emotional turmoil. One minute, I was depressed and envious of my friends’ freedom, then the next minute, I was pissed at myself for being weak. This summer was not the time to travel with my friends; it would have invalidated the previous months of self-isolation. I never hated anything so much in my life, choosing between what I wanted to do and what I needed to do. Staying home was always the safest choice. My days were filled with cooking and cleaning. Instead of going out to eat, I was a little Suzy Homemaker with my nose buried in a recipe book. Growing up, I had put learning how to cook on the back burner of my mind. Prior to COVID-19, I thought I was going to be like Lorelai Gilmore from “Gilmore Girls” or Carrie Bradshaw from “Sex and the City,” living off takeout and food from sit-down restaurants. Whenever I complained about my domestic duties and new lifestyle, waves of guilt crashed over me. How dare I hate staying at home? My boyfriend and his parents would say to me, “Things could be worse.” I remember crying to my best friend about how I hated myself for not finding the silver lining. My best friend told me, “It’s acceptable to feel depressed and miss how life used to be. Only having a positive mindset is a form of toxic positivity. We shouldn’t minimize how we feel and punish ourselves. It doesn’t allow us to grieve and have authentic human emotions.” But why grieve? My loved ones aren’t dead. I’m not ill. How could I be so depressed? How dare I yearn to travel while others have lost their jobs? How selfish am I to grieve for my old life while I sit here atop my ivory tower? Even looking at old traveling photos made me feel like I was cheating on my COVID-19 life. It was like I was in a bad relationship with this pandemic, constantly making excuses for how great everything was, even though I felt like I was suffocating. I remember lying to my cousin in April, “Now, I have time to do all the things I wanted to do.” The reality was I never wanted to learn how to bake banana bread, I never enjoyed exercising, I fell asleep during meditation, TikTok didn’t interest me, and pretending to be “productive” during a global pandemic was not how I wanted to cope with stress. I had the time to do all of that in the beginning of my gap year, but I still chose not to. All I wanted to do was travel. Unfortunately, I can’t break up with this pandemic. I know traveling now would be a hassle. Leaving the country is out of the question. Domestic travel would still be a nightmare. I would have to research each state and its requirements about self-quarantining upon arrival. Also, being the Type A person that I am, I would undergo some psychological stress navigating through an airport and sitting on a plane. In addition, I would have to buy cleaning supplies and personally clean my hotel room or Airbnb because I would not trust the staff cleaning my room to test COVID-negative. There are conflicting articles about COVID-19 droplets surviving on surfaces, so, of course, I would err on the side of caution. Then would come the shaming from my friends who have been staying at home with their children. I can hear them now: “How can you be so reckless and selfish?” For now, I have benched my gap year while I try to devise a new master plan for my playbook. If there isn’t a safe vaccine by the end of 2020, I’m considering buying a van and customizing it for road trips. This type of traveling comes with its own headaches, but I’m sure I can make do. After all, I am an impatient millennial putting my adventures on hold. Hell hath no fury like a restless young woman! Anita Saesing has always been nomadic.  She was born in California,, but spent her teenage years in Maryland and Pennsylvania.  Before she graduated from high school, an elderly couple from her previous apartment complex invited her to live with them in Arizona.  Four days after her high school graduation, she packed her bags and joined them on their cross-country road trip.  She spent her college years working at various places including a childcare center and hospital HR office.  She was the first in her family to graduate debt-free from college. Anita graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Business Management from Grand Canyon University.  One day, she desires to live in Italy and “do as the Romans do.”

September 18, 2020 Dear Editor, Greetings from beautiful, sunny, California -- or should I say beautiful, hot, burning California? For the first time in weeks, today’s morning sky was blue, not orange or apocalyptic gray, and no ash fell like rain. I am fortunate to live in San Diego, removed a distance from the actual wildfires devastating millions and millions of acres of trees and brush. However, our air quality is in the moderate to dangerous category here-- hundreds of miles from the actual fires. The Bobcat fire, east of Los Angeles, in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, was 6 percent contained yesterday, and because of deteriorating weather conditions has dropped to 3 percent today. Firefighters are struggling to contain this fire and to protect the important Mount Wilson Observatory. Farther north and east of the Bay Area the fires have once again destroyed the area destroyed by the Paradise fire in 2018. Families who had just managed to recover from that fire have once again lost their homes. 7.900 wildfires, 3.3 million acres, and this weekend is predicted to bring higher temperatures, gusty winds and decreased humidity--all conditions leading to higher risks for our beautiful state and the thousands and thousands of firefighters risking their lives to battle the flames. Marines from nearby Camp Pendleton, just 30 miles from where I sit, are being sent to work alongside of firefighters across the state. We are struggling here--fires, heat, power outages, poor air quality, loss of life, homes and forests. As we grapple with this natural disaster, it is layered with our struggle in this time of the COVID-19 pandemic, community unrest, school closures, economic hardship and overall political turmoil. Our wonderful Governor, Gavin Newsom, has worked tirelessly to lead us through all that challenges us; yet upon a visit to our state on Monday, the current President of the United States encouraged us with “it’s going to get cooler...science doesn’t know” I pass those words on to all of our suffering Californians! Hopefully November will bring our nation true leadership and the deep empathy we yearn for as all of us, in California and across our nation, endure great hardship. California will survive, our nation will survive, as we always have, for we are a land of strong, determined, hopeful and resourceful people! Jeanette Handelsman/San Diego, CA Jeanette Handelsman is the Alumnae Relations Coordinator at the Academy of Our Lady of Peace in San Diego, CA. Herself an alumna of O.L.P, she previously served as a teacher in the science department and as the Assistant Principal for Campus Life. She graduated from Lone Mountain College in San Francisco with a B.A. in Biology and earned a Masters in Educational Leadership at the University of San Diego. Jeanette is a native San Diegan but spent her young adulthood, particularly during the turbulent ‘60s, in San Francisco and the north Bay. Although semiretired,, she continues the work she loves at her alma mater while being an involved and delighted mother of three and grandmother of four. When not in a pandemic, she loves to travel, especially to the Val di Non, in the Trentino-Alto Adige region of northern Italy, to visit her close family there.

One film journalist’s stream-of-consciousness cinematic journey through the pandemic, Part 17 By Laurence Lerman Recent days have taken on a startlingly Old Testament kind of feel, fully rigged with fires, hurricanes, floods and illness. I’d initially thrown politics on the list, but the idea of applying so biblical a description to the maneuvers of the current President is an insult to Testaments both old and new (the Talmud, as well). Movie streaming came in second to watching the news this week, my playlist consisting of solely two titles—one, a big Hollywood title that I’ve seen numerous times, the other, a newer one from a distant land that I’d heard good things about. At 10:00 p.m. last Sunday, I began by pressing play on Adrian Lyne’s 1987 Fatal Attraction, the highly charged urbane drama-turned-thriller of its day that provided lots of water cooler chat before Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus was even published. The tale of a married family man (Michael Douglas) who has a wild weekend fling with a single career woman (Glenn Close) who then grows obsessed with him and ultimately endangers his wife (Anne Archer) and young daughter, Fatal Attraction holds up marvelously. While still evoking its place in time, the story is enduring; the script by James Dearden, lively; the production, slick and sturdy; and the direction by Lyne, impeccable. (Following Lyne’s artistic trajectory, Fatal Attraction is perfectly situated between 1986’s sexed-up 9½ Weeks and 1993’s Vegas couples therapy session Indecent Proposal.) Fatal Attraction hits the bullseye with its three central performances by Douglas, Close and Archer. Of the trio, it’s Ms. Archer’s portrayal of the perfect New York housewife and mother done wrong while transforming into a suburbanite (the family relocates from the Upper East Side to Westchester midway through) that is frequently overlooked. You can keep Close’s “I'm not going to be ignored, Dan” and Douglas’s portentous, “I don't think having dinner with anybody's a crime.” For my money, it’s all about Archer’s Beth Gallagher learning of her husband’s betrayal and identifying Close’s Alex Forrest as “the one with the blonde hair.” Then there’s her heartbreaking, “Do you love her?,” immediately followed by a howl of “What is the matter with you!?” before she kicks that son of a bitch out. Having looked at Fatal Attraction as a kind of cautionary tale on the consequences of infidelity in the age of AIDS for years, it took nearly two decades and one remarkable wife for me to accept another view, one that categorized the film as a reactionary symbol of the Reagan-era backlash against the feminist advances of the Seventies. It painted a picture of career women—that’s right, women working outside of the home!—setting out to steal your husband and destroy your family, one of the great “moral panics” of the Eighties. That the witchy woman was a perm-haired blonde with a downtown apartment in the meatpacking district was the perfect embellishment. Again, this was an angle of which I was unaware and had never considered. But then again, I was unfamiliar with second-wave feminism, Germaine Greer and all the related trimmings, so I wasn’t inclined to look at Fatal Attraction through those specs. But that aforementioned remarkable wife of mine, she sure was. She also pointed out that an intimate-partner-turned-stalker is, statistically, far likelier to be a man threatening a woman than vice versa. We’ve never watched Fatal Attraction together, come to think of it. I don’t know that we need to any time soon. I eased out of Lyne’s steamy drama and headed North to check out last year’s A White, White Day, the second feature by Iceland’s Hylnur Pálmason and the latest sampling of Nordic noir to arrive on these shores. That’s the genre that film and novel lovers have been kvelling over since the Atlantic crossing of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo novels and films of the 2000s, along with such Scandinavian TV imports as The Killing (2007), The Bridge (2011) and, most recently, Bordertown (2016). Taking a cue from its setting in a remote Icelandic town where everyone knows everyone, A White, White Day zeroes in on a semiretired, widowed policeman who begins to suspect that a fellow local may have been having had an affair with his late wife, who was killed a couple of years earlier in a mysterious car accident. Following his initial, circumstantial suspicions, the widower becomes consumed with finding out the truth, setting off a chain of increasingly dangerous actions that may prove to be not only his own undoing, but that of his fellow law enforcers, his wife’s possible lover and even his own family. A carefully crafted take on a familiar tale that smartly slides into the revenge thriller template while still remaining unpredictable, Pálmason’s bone-dry direction, a wintry leading turn by Ingvar Sigurdsson as the man taken over by late-stage anger and jealousy, a score of discordant strings and Iceland’s naturally imposing landscapes call the shots here. And it all comes to a climax with the outstanding use of a great Leonard Cohen song. Involving, focused, contemporary and uncomfortably quiet, A White, White Day is worth catching. Finally, a note on Linda Manz, the uniquely expressive former teenage performer who died last month at the age of 58, following a battle with cancer and pneumonia. Born in New York City, Manz’s first role came at the age of 15 in Terrence Malick’s Days of Heaven (1978), the bona fide Seventies classic about a romantic triangle set in the Texas Panhandle during the Depression between two peripatetic workers (Richard Gere and Brooke Adams) and a wealthy farmer (Sam Shepard). Manz portrays Gere’s sister and the film’s curious narrator, her voiceover adding an elegiac quality to the ultimately tragic proceedings. She next appeared in Philip Kaufman’s dynamic 1979 period drama The Wanderers, about a Bronx street gang that comes up against pending adulthood and the times-they-are-a changin’ Sixties. Manz portrays Peewee, the diminutive girlfriend of “Terror,” Erland Van Lidth De Jeude’s 6’6”, 340-pound leader of the Fordham Baldies, the nastiest gang to ever stomp across the Grand Concourse. The very sight of Ms. Manz when she’s standing next to her hulking man is effective enough, but her toughie with a heart of gold attitude and thick Bronx accent brings some unexpected pathos to her supporting role. That sensitivity continued in Dennis Hopper’s 1980 cult drama Out of the Blue, where Manz portrays the troubled, Elvis-loving daughter of a high-strung mother (Sharon Farrell) and ex-con father (Hopper). It was to be Manz’s last memorable performance, as she worked much less as she moved into her 20s. She was last seen in bit parts more than two decades ago, most appropriately in Harmony Korine’s strange 1997 drama Gummo and very forgettably in David Fincher’s thriller exercise The Game from the same year. Both filmmakers were clearly fans of her earlier work. More or less retired from the movie game for years and living with her husband and family in Antelope Valley in Northern Los Angeles County, she gave a memorable interview to the Village Voice’s Nick Pinkerton in 2011. Aware that Malick’s film from that year, The Tree of Life, had won the Palme d’Or at Cannes, she admitted she hadn’t seen any of his movies since Days, nor many others. “I’m not a movie buff, I don’t go to the movies,” she said, simply. A rising star who slipped out of the film industry and then just didn’t feel like going to the movies. Sort of refreshing, isn’t it? Laurence Lerman is a film journalist, former editor of Video Business--Variety's DVD trade publication--and husband to The Insider's own Gwen Cooper. Over the course of his career he has conducted one-on-one interviews with just about every major director working today, including Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino, Clint Eastwood, Kathryn Bigelow, Ridley Scott, Walter Hill, Spike Lee, and Werner Herzog, among numerous others. Once James Cameron specifically requested an interview with Laurence by name, which his wife still likes to brag about. Most recently, he is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online review site DiscDish.com.

By Andy Borowitz September 14, 2020 WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Hinting darkly that “people are saying there’s something going on,” Donald J. Trump claimed that the former Vice-President Joe Biden is using “performance-enhancing books.” Pointing to Biden’s strong performances in the Vice-Presidential debates of 2008 and 2012, Trump alleged, “It’s clear that he was under the influence of books.” “Every time he got asked a question, he pulled facts out of thin air,” Trump said. “You can’t do that unless you’re pumped up on books.” Trump warned that, unless he is caught, Biden will try to use performance-enhancing books before the Presidential debates, which start later this month, and urged that both candidates be tested for books before the contest. “I have no problem with being tested,” Trump declared. “I am a hundred per cent book-free.” Andy Borowitz is a Times best-selling author and a comedian who has written for The New Yorker since 1998. He writes The Borowitz Report, a satirical column on the news.

Jeffrey D. Sachs, Chair of the Commission, Introduces the Report to Insider Readers To the readers of The Insider: The COVID-19 pandemic has created the most complex and far-reaching global crisis since World War II and the deepest economic crisis since the Great Depression. Addressing the crisis adequately requires strategies across several domains: public health, medicine, virology, vaccine development, finance, economics, workplace safety, and mental health and social services. Because there is such a mix of actions needed, the Lancet medical journal decided to convene a global commission to advise governments and U.N. agencies, drawing upon global experts in the relevant areas. The Lancet Editor-in-Chief Dr. Richard Horton kindly invited me to chair the new Commission. The Commission issued its first statement on the occasion of the opening of the 75th Session of the U.N. General Assembly on September 15. Jeffrey Sachs University Professor at Columbia University Chair of the Lancet Covid-19 Commission Lancet COVID-19 Commission Statement on the Occasion of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly (Full Text) Jeffrey Sachs Chair, Commissioners, Task Force Chairs and Commission Secretariat September 14, 2020 Executive summary The Lancet COVID-19 Commission was launched on July 9, 2020, to assist governments, civil society, and UN institutions in responding effectively to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Commission aims to offer practical solutions to the four main global challenges posed by the pandemic: suppressing the pandemic by means of pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical interventions; overcoming humanitarian emergencies, including poverty, hunger, and mental distress, caused by the pandemic; restructuring public and private finances in the wake of the pandemic; and rebuilding the world economy in an inclusive, resilient, and sustainable way that is aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Climate Agreement. Many creative solutions are already being implemented, and a key aim of the Commission is to accelerate their adoption worldwide. The origins of COVID-19 and averting zoonotic pandemics The COVID-19 pandemic is the latest—but certainly not the last—emerging infectious disease, preceded by HIV/AIDS, Nipah, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus, H1N1 influenza, Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus, Zika, Ebola, and others. These diseases are zoonoses, resulting from pathogens being transmitted from animals to humans. To protect against zoonoses, we require new precautions, such as ending deforestation and protecting conservation areas and endangered species. The origins of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are yet to be definitively determined, but evidence to date supports the view that SARS-CoV-2 is a naturally occurring virus rather than the result of laboratory creation and release. Research into the origins of SARS-CoV-2 should proceed expeditiously, scientifically, and objectively, unhindered by geopolitical agendas and misinformation. The urgency of suppressing the pandemic The COVID-19 epidemic can and should be suppressed through non-pharmaceutical interventions, including effective community health services, that cut transmission of the virus, to be followed by the introduction of effective and safe vaccines as rapidly as science permits. Countries should not rely on herd immunity by natural infection to suppress the epidemic. The disease and death that would accompany natural infection rates to reach herd immunity, typically estimated as 40–60% of the population infected, would be unacceptably high. Uncertainty also remains about the duration of acquired immunity from past infections. The great divide in the outcomes of the epidemic has been the relative success of the Asia–Pacific region compared with western Europe and the Americas. The Asia–Pacific region has largely suppressed transmission and mortality (less than 10 deaths per million). Western Europe and the Americas have had very high transmission and mortality (several hundred deaths per million in several countries). Many low-income countries have suppressed the epidemic, such as Cambodia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, and Viet Nam. To implement non-pharmaceutical interventions, we urge countries to scale up with all urgency their public health workforces, including epidemiologists, public health technicians, nurses, testers, contact tracers, and community health workers. Community health workers can contribute to controlling community spread and protecting vulnerable people in the community, particularly through testing, education on prevention and treatment, and education on the mental health effects of social isolation. The vexing question of whether to close schools is perhaps the single most challenging non-pharmaceutical intervention. Schools can safely reopen when community transmission is low and school facilities and staff have been appropriately prepared. When it is not safe to open schools, countries and localities should aim to implement online education accessible to all students. Health professionalism One reason for failure to suppress the epidemic is a style of political leadership that has been called medical populism; Lasco has described political leaders as “simplifying the pandemic by downplaying its impacts or touting easy solutions or treatments, spectacularizing their responses to crisis, forging divisions between the ‘people’ and dangerous ‘others’, and making medical knowledge claims to support the above”. Lasco makes three cases in point: the US President, Donald Trump, the Philippine President, Rodrigo Duterte, and the Brazilian President, Jair Bolsonaro. We call on governments to prioritise advice from the professional public health community, working in cooperation with international agencies and learning from the best practices of other nations. All countries should combat decisions based on rumour-mongering and misinformation. Leaders should desist from expressing personal viewpoints that are at odds with science. Addressing the inequities of the epidemic The COVID-19 pandemic is bringing to light and exacerbating pre-existing social, economic, and political inequalities, including inequalities of wealth, health, wellbeing, social protection, and access to basic needs including food, health care, and schooling. The pandemic is bringing about a sharp increase in income inequality and jobs crises for low-paid workers. Health inequalities also pose major issues in this pandemic; as of December, 2017, half of the world's population did not have access to essential health services. Vulnerable populations (including the poor, older people, people with previous health conditions, people who are incarcerated, refugees, and Indigenous peoples) are bearing a disproportionate burden of the pandemic. The abrupt shift to an online economy came in the context of a deep, pre-existing digital divide in high-quality digital access. We call on all relevant UN agencies to take concrete steps with the digital industry and governments to accelerate universal access to digital services, including public–private financing to extend connectivity to hard-to-reach populations. Among the most urgent challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic are hunger and food insecurity for poor and vulnerable populations. The pandemic also poses great concerns for mental health, especially for lower-income populations, and there is high inequality in the provision of services for mental health, especially in lower-income and middle-income countries. The gender dimensions of COVID-19 must also be prioritised, in recognition of the documented increase in unplanned pregnancies for teenage and young women, and the increase in gender-based violence. Data needs The UN Statistical Commission, working with partner UN institutions and with national statistical agencies, should prepare near-real-time data on highly vulnerable populations and their conditions, with a special focus on infection and death rates, poverty, joblessness, mental health, violence, hunger, forced labour, and other forms of extreme deprivation and abuses of human rights. Urgent surveying should be undertaken to identify humanitarian needs and hunger hotspots, especially among the poor, older people, people living with disabilities, Indigenous peoples, women who are vulnerable, young children, refugees, people who are incarcerated, people working in high-risk jobs (eg, meatpacking plants or guest workers), and other minority populations (including ethnic, racial, and religious minorities). Meeting the urgent fiscal needs of the developing countries One of the characteristics of the global crisis is the sharp drop in public revenues at all government levels. The situation for developing countries will become increasingly dire as many countries find themselves facing rising social needs without the means to finance social services. Moreover, many developing countries currently do not have the kinds of social protection programmes that are most urgently needed at this juncture, such as unemployment insurance, income support, and nutrition support. Some developing countries will require considerable international concessional financing (ie, grants and low-interest, long-term loans) from the international financing institutions, notably the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the multilateral and regional development banks, as well as the orderly restructuring of their sovereign debts to both public and private creditors. Now, more than ever, is the time for countries to meet their commitments to providing 0·7% of gross domestic product as official development aid. Special efforts must be made to fight corruption, to ensure that new aid flows reach the intended beneficiaries. Global justice in access to safe and effective vaccines, therapeutics, diagnostics, and equipment The pharmaceutical industry and academic community, supported by governments, have undertaken a remarkable effort to develop new approaches for the suppression of the pandemic, including vaccines, therapeutics, rapid diagnostics, and treatment regimens. The introduction of new vaccines and therapeutics should follow rigorous testing and evaluation through all clinical phases and must not be subject to dangerous political interference. In the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, there have already been breakdowns in the global health governance of vaccine development, even leading to the new term vaccine nationalism. Any new vaccine or therapeutic must be developed and implemented with a view to equitable access across and within countries. No population should be prohibited from accessing a vaccine because of cost or have its access predicated on its participation in clinical trials. We strongly support the multilateral initiative Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator to promote the universal, equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics, and other tools, and within that initiative, COVAX Facility, the vaccine pillar. Complementary approaches in support of this multilateral initiative would help to strengthen equitable access across and within countries. Promoting a jobs-based green recovery Economic recovery plans should support the transition towards sustainable and inclusive societies based on the SDGs and the Paris Climate Agreement. Public investment should be oriented towards sustainable industries and the digital economy, and should spur complementary private investments. Preventing a wave of bankruptcies among small and medium-sized businesses with viable prospects is an important priority. A major goal of the recovery should be an unprecedented commitment to reskilling and upskilling people, including the skills to prepare workers for the digital economy. The EU Green Deal, long-term budget (2021–27), and new recovery fund marks an exemplary framework for long-term recovery, including mid-century goals on climate safety, energy transition, and circular economy, with a comprehensive €1·8 trillion budget. This approach can serve as an exemplar for other regions. In general, recoveries should be smart (based on digital technologies), inclusive (targeting lower-income households), and sustainable (featuring investments in clean energy and reduced pollution). Multilateralism and the UN system Global recovery will be greatly facilitated by cooperation at the regional and international level, both in controlling the epidemic and in adopting new green recovery programmes. We strongly urge the United States, EU, China, Russia, India, Mercosur, the African Union, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the Caribbean Community, and other nations and regional groupings to put aside rivalries and beggar-thy-neighbour policies (such as trade and financial sanctions) in favour of coordinated regional responses. Trade and financial sanctions, or other isolationist policies, and talk of a new cold war between the United States and China, are dangerous for global recovery and peace. The COVID-19 pandemic hit during the 75th anniversary year of the UN. The indispensable role of the UN has been evident throughout the course of the pandemic to date, especially for the world's most vulnerable populations, and yet the UN system is also under attack and international law has been undermined. We strongly support the UN and call on all nations to honour the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and to contribute to the efficacy of the UN multilateral system, including through crucial financing of UN institutions. We call on the United States to reverse its decisions to withdraw from the WHO, the Paris Climate Agreement, the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, and the UN Human Rights Council. We strongly support the unique role of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and multilateral development banks in providing urgent financing and technical assistance for emerging and developing economies. We call on their shareholders to consider scaling up the already unprecedented efforts at securing larger financing for these countries through an increased allocation or more efficient use of special drawing rights, or through debt restructuring when needed. We also urge the more affluent shareholder countries to provide additional concessional resources. We strongly support the indispensable role of the WHO in controlling the COVID-19 pandemic, and call on all nations to increase, rather than decrease, their funding support and political backing for the work of the WHO at this fraught time. In this regard, we also support the call for an independent analysis of the WHO response, to strengthen the institution and its central, unique role in global public health. Future work of The Lancet COVID-19 Commission The Lancet COVID-19 Commission will monitor the global progress in suppressing the pandemic and making an inclusive and sustainable recovery with a new set of metrics that it will regularly publish. The Commission Task Forces will consider in detail many of the complex issues already raised, including the best ways to promote decent jobs and sustainable development. The ten priority actions of the Commission are summarised in panel 1. The next scheduled Statement of the Commission will be in early 2021. Panel 1 Ten priority actions Origins: track down the origins of the virus in an open, scientific, and unbiased way not influenced by geopolitical agendas Non-pharmaceutical interventions: suppress the epidemic through the proven package of non-pharmaceutical interventions, as accomplished by several countries including several in the Asia–Pacific region Science-based policy making: base policy making on objective scientific evidence and stop politicians and others in positions of power from subverting clinical trials and other scientific protocols Timely and consistent data: collect and publish timely and internationally consistent data on the state of the pandemic, including humanitarian and economic consequences Justice in access to tools to fight COVID-19: ensure universal access to the tools to fight COVID-19, including test kits, therapeutics, and prospective vaccines Emergency financing: secure access of developing countries to financing from international sources, especially from the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Protect vulnerable groups: direct urgent protection towards vulnerable groups, including older people, people in poverty and hunger, women who are vulnerable, children, people with chronic diseases and disabilities, the homeless, migrants, refugees, Indigenous Peoples, and ethnic and racial minorities Long-term financial reform: prepare for a deep restructuring of global finances, including debt relief, new forms of international financing, and reform of monetary arrangements Green and resilient recovery: economic recovery will be based on public-investment-led growth in green, digital, and inclusive technologies, based on the Sustainable Development Goals Global peace and cooperation: support UN institutions and the UN Charter, resisting any attempts at a new cold war For full text see: https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2820%2931927-9

Here's How to Bring Them Together Jeffrey D. Sachs | August 27, 2020   |   CNN.com Editor's Note: Jeffrey Sachs is a professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author; view more opinion articles on CNN. (CNN) America has been coming apart at the seams, with Democrats and Republicans increasingly unable of communicating with one another. Red states and blue states, as decided in the 2016 election, have confronted each other in incomprehension, and are leading very different lives with very different economic conditions. Reuniting America requires a forward-looking path of sustainable development that benefits all regions, including the states that have been hard hit by the long-term decline in manufacturing jobs. The geographical divide pitting the blue ocean coasts against the red interior is partly culture, to be sure. Social liberals are heavily concentrated on the coasts, while social conservatives, especially White Evangelical Protestants, are heavily concentrated in the South and Midwest. Yet the blue-red divide has a crucial socioeconomic dimension as well. Though Democrats had been considered the party of the working class since the New Deal, they carried the richest counties and lost in many of the poorest in 2016. Understanding that fact is key not only for the Democrats to retake the White House but for the country as a whole to reunite in a common purpose. As candidate, Joe Biden is conveying the right messages. Democrats have become the party of social progressives, African Americans and other minorities, environmentalists, and younger voters, as well as the party of those with bachelor's degrees or higher. Republicans, meanwhile, became the party of social conservatives, especially Evangelicals, and increasingly of White working-class and older voters. Rapid technological changes have pulled blue and red states apart economically, which are notably most advanced in the blue states. Democratic Party strongholds on the two coasts are heavily oriented towards the high-tech service sectors, while staunch Republican Party regions in the interior are heavily concentrated in the goods sectors, such as manufacturing and fossil fuels. The economies driving blue states are based heavily on professional sectors that draw on a workforce with bachelor's degrees or higher. Meanwhile, the goods-producing sectors of red states, including agriculture and forestry, mining, construction, and manufacturing, draw on a workforce with much lower rates of college completion. When comparing election outcomes with data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Clinton carried 17 of the 20 states with relatively large service sectors, while Trump carried 27 of the 30 states with relatively large goods sectors. The 15 states with the highest proportion of employment in mining, logging, construction, and manufacturing all went for Trump, while 9 of the 10 states with the lowest proportion of workers in goods-producing sectors went for Clinton. Clinton carried the states with high-tech services. All 15 states with the highest proportion of adults with advanced degrees (post-Bachelor's) went for Clinton, while 24 of the 25 states with the lowest proportion of advanced degrees went for Trump. Thirteen of the 15 richest states (ranked by median household income) voted for Clinton, while 22 of the poorest 25 states voted for Trump. These high incomes reflect the earnings of the high-tech professional sectors. In 1979, employment in manufacturing peaked at 19 million jobs, but declined to around 12 million by the time of the 2016 election. By 2016, many industrial workers felt that the Democrats were no longer representing their interests. Trump swooped in on these states during his first campaign to wrest many of them from Democrats, charging them with ignoring their job plight. He claimed that the jobs had been lost to China, Mexico, and immigrants, and that he would restore the jobs through protectionism and anti-immigrant policies. These arguments were grossly exaggerated and ignored the forces of automation, which has led to an increase in output of goods despite fewer workers, thanks to robotics and other technological advances. Voters in red states that both produce and use fossil fuels more heavily have been wary of plans to decarbonize the economy. Trump promised as well to resurrect the red-states' fossil-fuel industries. In fact, Trump's remedies have been so much hocus-pocus. The number of those employed in manufacturing in 2019 remained well below 2008 numbers. The number of manufacturing jobs in August 2020 was 247,000 less than at the start of his term in January 2017. He did not and could not bring jobs back from China since most of the job decline in industry reflected automation not trade, and since even jobs squeezed out of China by US tariffs will simply shift jobs to Vietnam or other low-income but highly productive countries. Moreover, Trump has not and could not resurrect the coal, oil and gas industries. His promises to do so are recklessly blind to the world's shift away from fossil fuels and towards green energy due both to the climate crisis and also to falling costs of renewables. Jobs in mining and oil and gas extraction are down by 30,000 since Trump took office and will fall further as America's declining and money-losing fossil-fuel production is replaced by wind and solar power. The S&P Oil & Gas Exploration & Production stock index is down 51.5% over the past year, while the Clean Energy S&P is up 50.7% over the same period. Trump did not and could not create decent red-state jobs by clamping down on immigration, since immigrants were never the cause of red-state job woes to begin with. He also promised a boom in construction jobs building new infrastructure across the US, but he failed to do so, as he lacked any serious vision of what the country needs. Democrats now have the opportunity to reunite the nation by creating jobs across all regions. They should offer an industrial plan to build the next generation of electric vehicles, smart grids, advanced batteries, and green fuels (such as hydrogen produced with renewable energy) -- all of which would create new jobs throughout the industrial heartland. The Democrats can win over the natural-resource states by playing to their great strengths: massive low-cost renewable energy (especially wind and solar power) and new mining resources for advanced batteries, electric vehicles, wind turbines, and other parts of the new industrial economy. The Democrats should also lead on the long-delayed modernization of infrastructure: interstate transmission lines to carry renewable energy; buildings retrofitted for electrification and energy efficiency; charging stations and other facilities for electric vehicles; transmission pipelines for hydrogen and other green fuels; and a 5G network for advanced digital services. In sum, the path to sustainable investment is the path to a reunified America, with all parts of the nation contributing to the nation's recovery. https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/15/opinions/trump-economy-red-blue-state-sachs/index.html

FRED PLOTKIN is one of America’s foremost experts on opera and has distinguished himself in many fields as a writer, speaker, consultant and as a compelling teacher. He is an expert on everything Italian, the person other so-called Italy experts turn to for definitive information.  Fred discovered the concept of "The Renaissance Man" as a small child and has devoted himself to pursuing that ideal as the central role of his life. In a “Public Lives” profile inThe New York Timeson August 30, 2002, Plotkin was described as "one of those New York word-of-mouth legends, known by the cognoscenti for his renaissance mastery of two seemingly separate disciplines: music and the food of Italy." In the same publication, on May 11, 2006, it was written that "Fred is a New Yorker, but has the soul of an Italian."

Insider Columnist John Rolfe Describes His Ongoing Battle with the Virus By John Rolfe I got a look at a questionnaire I will have to fill out each day at work when I start driving a school bus in October. Some of the questions made me laugh. Under “Are you currently experiencing, or have you experienced in the past 14 days, any of the following?” these were listed: head or muscle aches, fatigue, and headache. “Crikey,” I thought. “At this age, I always feel that way.” Indeed, when I rise from my bed, my six-decade-old carcass creaks like an old wooden schooner buffeted by wind and high seas. How could I possibly tell something was actually amiss? Not to worry. When you contract COVID-19, you know it. My case arrived wrapped in irony, several days after I’d completed a two-month gig at an intermediate school in New York’s Hudson Valley. I got a phone call from the district informing me that one of my five coworkers had tested positive and developed symptoms -- on the final day that I’d worked at the school. There’d been nine people total in the building and we’d worn masks and tried to keep our distance, but as the weeks passed and no one, or at least anyone any of us knew, got sick, we became a little lax by mutual consent. Masks slipped down even though occasional cases were reported elsewhere in the school district. Such behavior is human nature. It’s tough to maintain a constant, strict vigilance, especially when the consequences of failing to do so remain an abstraction. The abstraction hit home an hour or so after my phone call when I began feeling feverish. I was running a 102.6°, a temperature that would linger for the next eight days. I felt spacey. Sleep was turbulent, beset by a weird recurring dream of classroom clutter. The thought of food made me queasy and my sense of taste was off. Water seemed metallic. Coffee reminded me of burnt transmission fluid (what I imagine it to taste like, not that I imbibe automotive products). I went through chills-sweats cycles and fatigue, but no coughing, congestion, shortness of breath, or sore throat. I suspected the cause was a tick-borne bug instead, as I’d been bitten recently. The doctor at the clinic I visited immediately suspected as much. Along with a COVID test, blood work for Lyme disease and similar maladies was done. Antibiotics were prescribed. The results came back positive for COVID-19, negative for all else. So far I’ve been very lucky. My coworker was hospitalized, describing the virus as the worst ordeal she’s ever been through. The worst I’ve endured has been a sudden wave of nausea that made me wretch so violently I blacked out, landing on my pasty face. I came to heaving, and as I lay there slowly recovering, I couldn’t help wondering why anyone would not want to do what they could to stop this misery. I understand laziness. Guilty as charged. But willfully flouting long-established pandemic containment procedures because … why? To make a political statement? To protect one’s sacred right to spread disease? To hear some complaints, you’d think wearing a mask and maintaining social distancing were like being asked to scale Mount Everest clad only in underwear, high heels and a feather boa. What’s most infuriating is not that I got sick. It’s that others are still suffering when this country could have made a much better, good-faith effort to lessen the impact and duration of the pandemic. New York State has done a good job of containment, but the bug still lurks here like the creature from Alien. I don’t expect perfection from anyone, or for experts to know everything about the virus, but at least being able to say we all tried everything we could would make it easier to accept getting sick or others falling ill. Instead, President Trump has punted the pandemic playbook, downplayed the threat, mocked masks and led a charge into a cesspool of the most pointless, unnecessary, stupid, partisan antagonism, willful ignorance and distrust in science and agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). I wonder what pandemic pooh-poohers think when they get sick. The virus clearly affects everyone differently. People I know have felt like they were suffering a heart or lung problem. Others have lost loved ones. You can’t possibly know how COVID-19 will hit you. Feeling lucky, punk? Able to afford missing time at work or surprise medical bills? Up for having your life disrupted indefinitely? Why would anyone not care about having to deal with these things or whether others will? So I chew on my vexation while I recover. As of this writing, I’m quarantined and have been fever-free for six days. My appetite is returning but my energy waxes and wanes. My wife and son are fine. Meanwhile, I commiserate with our hen Freda, who is now cooped up in our basement due to a mysterious ailment that has given her a droopy comb and lethargic demeanor. I see myself in her. When I finally return to normal, I suspect I’ll notice the difference. John Rolfe is a former senior editor for Sports Illustrated for Kids, a longtime columnist for the Poughkeepsie Journal/USA Today Network, and author of The Goose in the Bathroom: Stirring Tales of Family Life. His school bus drivin’ blog “Hellions, Mayhem and Brake Failure” is parked on his website Celestialchuckle.com (https://celestialchuckle.com) with the meter running.

By Jessie Seigel Investigative journalist and author Bob Woodward just released tapes of phone conversations with Donald Trump that give us plain, irrefutable evidence of Trump’s full and early knowledge of, and deliberate lies about, the dangers of COVID-19. Though anyone sensible knows Trump has been lying for months, hearing it out loud in his own words—at this moment in time—might make enough of those in the Trump cult finally come to their senses during this election season, and end the national horror we’ve been enduring for the last three-and-a half years. However, if Woodward, an associate editor at the Washington Post, had written articles and released these tapes earlier, instead of timing the taped revelations to promote his new book, Rage, which will be published on September 15, he could, potentially, have saved thousands of lives. In an article on Wednesday (9/9) in the Washington Post, media columnist Margaret Sullivan quoted Woodward as saying that, in February, when these phone calls with Trump occurred, there was not yet a “panic” over the virus and neither the source of Trump’s information nor the truth of what he was admitting was clear. Fair enough. But why didn’t Woodward report Trump’s statements that “it goes through the air,” “it’s more deadly than even your strenuous flus,” and “it’s not just old—it’s plenty of young people,” or release the tapes in May, when the extreme dangers of COVID-19 were clear? Sullivan cites his reasoning: Woodward said his aim was to provide a fuller context than could occur in a news story: “I knew I could tell the second draft of history, and I knew I could tell it before the election.” (Former Washington Post publisher Phil Graham famously called journalism “the first rough draft of history.”) […] It took months, Woodward told me, to do the reporting that put it all in context, which is what he believes his mission as an author is […] Woodward said he believes his highest purpose isn’t to write daily stories but to give his readers the big picture—one that may have a greater effect, especially with a consequential election looming. If Woodward had said he struggled between the public benefit of saving people from COVID-19 in the short run and preventing an authoritarian takeover in November in the longer run, I could, perhaps, understand his thinking as a legitimate ethical struggle. But, in my view, Woodward’s framing of his reasons smacks of a sense of self-importance and self-aggrandizement. In stating, “I knew I could tell the second draft of history,” Woodward is placing his own sought place in history ahead of his duty as a journalist to give the public not only what they—as media people are so fond of putting it—“have a right to know,” but what they have a need to know. In maintaining that his highest purpose is to give his readers the big picture, Woodward is ignoring the higher purpose, as a human being, to give people information at a time when it will make a difference for their survival. Sadly, Woodward’s major considerations here square with my general view of him and his work. Woodward plays along to “get his story.” Playing along is necessary to get the story—agreed. But for how long? And to what purpose? Woodward’s purpose seems to have been his stature and his pocketbook—not about getting an important story of corruptive horror out, getting to the public what they needed to know when they needed to know it. There surely are news people who see their work in similar terms. But they are not the journalists I respect. Some may argue that earlier exposure of Trump’s statements would have made no difference, that his outrages are always quickly lost in the wake of his next outrage. Since Woodward chose to hold off on exposure, we’ll never know for sure. But I am strongly reminded of the film,, A Face in the Crowd, at the end of which the Trumpian demagogue Lonesome Rhodes unwittingly expresses his contempt for his followers on-air, and they finally understand what he is and desert him. This, in real life, could have been a similar moment. Certainly, some of those confused by Trump’s and the scientists’ opposing instructions would have been affected by hearing Trump, in his own voice, confidentially tell Woodward of the COVID-19 dangers while publicly urging them towards their deaths. Surely, where their lives were at stake, some of them would have turned away from Trump’s public blather and followed the scientists’ advice. Don’t get me wrong. Trump is the true villain here. I am very, very glad that Woodward has released his tapes of the phone conversations with Trump. I just wish that he had done it earlier or that his considerations of when to do so had been about us, rather than about furthering of his own interests. Jessie Seigel is a fiction writer, an associate editor at the Potomac Review, a reviewer for The Washington Independent Review of Books, and a dabbler in political cartoons at Daily Kos. She has twice received an Artist’s Fellowship from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities for her work. But, Seigel also had a long career as a government attorney, in which she honed her analytic skills. Of this double career, Seigel would say, “I guess my right and left brains are well balanced.” More on and from Seigel can be found at The Adventurous Writer, https://www.jessieseigel.com.

By Steve Koepp Until one Sunday evening six months ago, I had always been yoga-resistant. The more ubiquitous it was, with the armies of yogis carrying their mats over their shoulders like bandoliers, the more I wouldn’t go along. On top of it all, my wife Lesley is a devotee with a yoga-teaching certificate, so the prospect of having her “adjust” my yoga positions to perfection, as teachers do, was not for me. I was inflexible about gaining any more flexibility. That is, until lockdown came and there was nothing else to do–at least when it came to the usual mind-and-body pursuits. On the sidewalks of Brooklyn, even jogging had become controversial as runners contended with pedestrians for safe space. But then came a way for me to gracefully give up my yoga resistance. My wife suggested to my niece Rachel Maki, an expert with her own teaching practice in Rockaway Park, Queens, that she start an easy Zoom-hosted class that newbies like me would be tempted to join. Thus began “Sunday Funday Family Yoga,” as my brother-in-law Hans has called it. Every Sunday at 5:30 pm EDT, family and friends roll out their mats at home for the one-hour class. Part of the fun is seeing who’s there when we log in. Faces pop up from around the country. My sister Cathy in Minneapolis (Rachel’s mom) never misses, while her stepson Jake in Portland, Ore., has made appearances as well. On display are new babies (Sawyer) and old dogs (Patrick). “I’ve been loving this class because it allows me to share my passion with the people closest to me at heart, but not in location,” says our teacher Rachel. “It’s great to have a reason to get together every week.” The journey is a gentle one. While Rachel teaches at many levels, this class is more meditative than athletic. (There are sportier ones on weekdays.) In one of our first sessions, she introduced a slightly more challenging pose with the advice that if we can’t achieve it perfectly, “It’s not a big deal.” In the darker days of the lockdown, when life’s normal expectations were hard to meet, “It’s not a big deal” was a cliché with a new context. Around our house, it became a consoling mantra when things needed to be put in perspective. “She is encouraging, forgiving and funny, which also helps me outside of class,” says my sister, who is a high-school teacher herself. “In a time when it is difficult to be the best version of yourself, yoga with Rachel consistently helps me keep moving in that direction. Also, I feel stronger and more flexible, which is pretty great at 61!” As Rachel teaches it, the class is inclusive in the sense that everyone is arriving with different stresses and strains. Rachel’s sister Kate participated far into her pregnancy. “It has been super beneficial for not only my mind, but body pre- and post-partum,” says Kate. “As an instructor Rachel has been wonderfully accommodating to my ever-changing need for pose modifications.” My son Charlie, a high-school senior, says it helps rejuvenate him after hours of remote learning. Hans, for his part, is recovering from a hip replacement and welcomes yoga for its restorative qualities after rigorous physical therapy. But at one point, he asked Rachel, “When are you going to have a class for old and inflexible guys?” To which she replied, “Isn’t that what this is?” As for me, this was an opportunity to relieve anxiety and learn something new without embarrassing my competitive side. True to form, after just a few sessions, I declared myself to be “an intermediate,” which drew laughs, along with reminders that yoga is not graded on a competitive level like skiing or karate. Especially during a time when we were shut-in, yoga became like a trip outside, or at least a psychic connection with nature. We pose as mountains and trees, trying to achieve balance. I especially relate to the animal poses, which seem a bit like acting class. Poses like the crow or rooster are way beyond me, but I can manage aspects of the pigeon (which looks a bit like NYC roadkill, if you ask me). Our dog usually wakes up from a nap during class and seems to want to join in. He knows only two poses, of course (upward and downward dog), but he is well-practiced in his limited repertoire. While I started doing yoga as kind of a novelty, I realize that it’s better appreciated as a path. Everything around us may be uncertain and ambiguous at the moment, but yoga has a clear, positive purpose. Says Cathy: “Rachel leads us on a journey that is forgiving, challenging and ultimately restoring. She cheers us on and helps us stretch to be better. Literally!” As for the true yogis in the family, I imagine they feel validated to see the rest of us embrace the practice. I wouldn’t say they’re having the last laugh, because they’re too Zen for that, but it must be gratifying after waiting so patiently for the rest of us to see the light. Says my wife: “I love having my family engage in a practice I have loved for years, but that they previously thought was too hard–or too woo-woo.” By the way, as part of my evolution, I have come to appreciate the little “adjustments.” Fellow Insiders are welcome to the class and can inquire with Rachel here. Steve Koepp is a co-founder of From Day One. Previously, he was editorial director of Time Inc. Books, executive editor of Fortune and deputy managing editor of Time.