newyorker--2020-12-11--Ayanna Pressley and Abigail Spanberger on the Rift in the Democratic Party

Did appeals to democratic socialism and defunding the police by progressive candidates cost Democrats twelve seats in the November election ?
David Remnick speaks with Abigail Spanberger , a centrist congresswoman from Virginia whose caustic comments about progressive rhetoric were leaked to the press , and with Ayanna Pressley , of Massachusetts , one of the group of four congresswomen known as the Squad , who insists that impact rather than compromise is the way to sway voters .
Plus , two men convicted of a crime and caught in an impossible choice : Should they continue maintaining their innocence @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in order to be freed on parole ?
The Virginia Democrat has said that left-leaning rhetoric about democratic socialism and defunding the police cost the Party seats in the November election .
The Massachusetts Democrat argues that centrists overestimate the efficacy of bipartisan dealmaking .
“ The ultimate persuasion tool , ” she says , “ is impact.
” The Times Square Two Fight to Clear Their Names For decades , Eric Smokes and David Warren said that they were innocent of the charges on which they were convicted .
But in order @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to take responsibility for the crime .

Illustration by Golden Cosmos; Source photographs by Tom Williams / AFP / Getty (Pressley); Bill Clark / CQ Roll Call / Getty (Spanberger)
Did appeals to democratic socialism and defunding the police by progressive candidates cost Democrats twelve seats in the November election? David Remnick speaks with Abigail Spanberger, a centrist congresswoman from Virginia whose caustic comments about progressive rhetoric were leaked to the press, and with Ayanna Pressley, of Massachusetts, one of the group of four congresswomen known as the Squad, who insists that impact rather than compromise is the way to sway voters. Plus, two men convicted of a crime and caught in an impossible choice: Should they continue maintaining their innocence, or express remorse for the crime in order to be freed on parole?
Abigail Spanberger on the Democratic Rift
The Virginia Democrat has said that left-leaning rhetoric about democratic socialism and defunding the police cost the Party seats in the November election.
Ayanna Pressley on the Democratic Rift
The Massachusetts Democrat argues that centrists overestimate the efficacy of bipartisan dealmaking. “The ultimate persuasion tool,” she says, “is impact.”
The Times Square Two Fight to Clear Their Names
For decades, Eric Smokes and David Warren said that they were innocent of the charges on which they were convicted. But in order to be freed on parole they had to take responsibility for the crime.


newyorker--2020-12-11--What an F.D.A. Committee Weighed in Voting for the Pfizer COVID Vaccine

An all-day hearing of the Food and Drug Administration ’ s vaccine advisory committee closed , on Thursday evening , with a vote to recommend an Emergency Use Authorization of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people sixteen and older .
The proceedings involved a great deal of data and technical talk , but might be quickly summarized this way : there are things we still do not know about the vaccine , but nothing that we do know looks bad .
Indeed , the vaccine looks very , very good .
And its known goodness applies to a diverse range @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and older people .
An F.D.A .
analysis of the raw data , released earlier this week , confirmed previous reports that the vaccine ’ s efficacy in preventing disease in trial participants was close to ninety-five per cent .
That number held up under questioning from committee members , who represented a range of specialties , from pediatrics to virology , throughout the eight hours of the hearing .
Amid a pandemic—on a day when more than three thousand people in this country were reported to have died from COVID-19—that result is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reasonable to hope for even a couple of months ago .
As Dr. Doran Fink , of the F.D.A.
, said in one of the day ’ s presentations , there is no “ adequate , approved , and available alternative.
” It was a long day , but a reassuring and even energizing one .
Early Friday , the F.D.A .
issued a statement saying that , given the positive recommendation , it would “ rapidly work toward finalization and issuance ” of an E.U.A .
In other words , we may @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a nursing-care resident or a frontline health worker—being given the shot within a day or two .
( The E.U.A .
would allow the immediate use of a vaccine on an emergency basis , while a longer licensing process is pending . )
The F.D.A .
will not be the first to approve the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine .
On Tuesday , the United Kingdom began using it to vaccinate the residents and staff of nursing homes , and Canada approved it on Wednesday .
The F.D.A .
committee spent significant time @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the U.K. had allergic reactions .
According to British health authorities , both of them had enough of a history of serious reactions to other allergens that they carried EpiPens ( or their generic equivalent ) with them .
Some of the committee members appeared frustrated that there was not more specific information about the two cases , but part of their concern was that the news might discourage people who could safely take the vaccine from doing so .
Dr. Paul Offit , a committee member who works on vaccine education at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , said , “ This issue is not going to die until we have better data.
” At the same time , both committee members and presenters—representatives of Pfizer and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention took part in the hearings , too—noted that many vaccines induce allergic reactions in a small number of people .
As a result , there are tested options for keeping those people safe , from providing recipients with information sheets before they get a shot to insuring that the health-care professionals who administer the vaccines can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ anaphylactic reaction .
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Those and other factors that applied to groups with specific risks might , as Fink said , at another point , be “ handled through labelling.
” That said , the reactions that have emerged appear most often to be slight but distinct ( and concentrated on the second day after vaccination ) .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ spot where the shot was given ; others were fever , headache , and fatigue .
In Pfizer ’ s Phase III trials , which included forty-three thousand subjects , those reactions were more often seen in younger participants .
( The fear was that it could have been the opposite—some vaccines are tolerated badly by the elderly . )
More severe adverse events were “ few in number and comparable ” between the vaccinated and the placebo groups , suggesting that they may not have been caused by the vaccine .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lives . )
There were some oddities that may be a sign of something to watch—during the trials , four cases of Bell ’ s palsy , or a slackening of the face muscles , emerged in the group that got the vaccine , and there were none in the group that got the placebo .
Again , given the small incidence , it is hard to tell what that means .
According to the information that the F.D.A .
has , the number of cases among study participants is not out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The average layperson watching the hearing for reasons to be confident in the vaccine—someone , that is , who might not know what to make of the gruesome 3-D rendering of a spike protein that showed up on one slide—could have found plenty of them .
Indeed , there are indications that even one dose of the vaccine ( the clinical trial involved two shots , three weeks apart ) might offer some protection , a possibility that Pfizer will study further .
There were also many reminders that these times are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , “ normal.
” Comments from the public , which constituted a segment of the hearings , came from people wary of vaccines , but also from a clinical-trial participant who compared the daily death tolls to a series of 9/11 attacks , and said that he was proud of the role he had played to help bring them to an end .
And , of course , there was the patois of the COVID-19 videoconferencing era : “ I ’ m trying to activate my video ” ; “ I think you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can ’ t hear you , Amanda ” ; “ I apologize , I ’ d accidentally muted you when I was trying to get off here .
So I did not hear the question.
” Many of the concerns that did arise had to do with people who were not a part of the Pfizer study—most notably , children , pregnant women , and lactating women .
( Twenty-three participating women did become pregnant during the clinical trial , and one who received the placebo had a miscarriage , but it is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ might ultimately have affected those women or their babies . )
But , despite the uncertainty , the wording of the recommendation did not exclude pregnant women .
As Fink noted , in explaining why , many women with “ childbearing potential ” might be prioritized for vaccination—health-care workers , for example .
The F.D.A.
’ s position , at this point , is that , when it comes to being vaccinated , those women should get to “ make their own decision in conjunction with their health-care provider.
” Children are another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the ages of twelve and fifteen are just beginning , and the information for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds is scarcer than for other age groups , because few participated in the early trials .
The greatest moment of contention in the hearings concerned a proposal from Dr. Cody Meissner , a committee member affiliated with Tufts Children ’ s Hospital , in Boston , that the E.U.A .
cover people eighteen and older , rather than sixteen and older .
A number of committee members seconded that idea—Dr .
Archana Chatterjee , of Rosalind @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said a factor that , for her , weighed against authorizing the vaccine for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds now was that it wouldn ’ t be those young people themselves , but their parents , who would weigh the risks and make the decision .
On the other side , Dr. Ofer Levy spoke about how important young people were to the pandemic ’ s “ endgame.
” Dr. Eric Rubin argued against excluding those teen-agers .
“ Some of these kids are working in supermarkets , ” he said .
“ I hate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” After some more back-and-forth , Dr. Marion Gruber , of the F.D.A.
’ s Office of Vaccines Research and Review , suggested simply putting the proposal , with the language including sixteen-year-olds , to a vote .
“ I don ’ t want to vote against the E.U.A.
, ” Dr. Meissner said , as much as he ’ d like to see the language modified .
He abstained , and the recommendation was approved , seventeen to four .
( Dr. Chatterjee voted no . )
Gruber , after one final @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hear you , Marion !
” —thanked the members , and emphasized that the F.D.A .
would take their concerns into account as it proceeded to the next stage .
This is , after all , only an emergency-use authorization , and the scrutiny of the vaccine will continue , as will the clinical trials .
Early in the meeting , Dr. Steven Goodman , of Stanford , had noted that an ethical dilemma isn ’ t one that has a right answer and a wrong one—it is one for which there are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in different ways .
He was applying that point to another major subject of the hearings : whether people in the clinical trials who had received the placebo should be prioritized for receiving the vaccine .
On the one hand , they had taken a risk to protect their communities , and so they deserved a spot near the front of the line .
On the other , there are still things to learn from the clinical trials , which would be less useful if the control group essentially disappeared .
( A @ @ @ @ @ @ @ participants do not know if they have received the placebo—learning that they had not been vaccinated would require “ unblinding.
” ) One option that Pfizer suggested was giving the placebo recipients the real vaccine as they become eligible for it , even if that effectively meant putting an early end to their participation in the trial—for example , a teacher who was a trial volunteer would not be left behind when teachers became eligible .
But she also would not leap ahead to join higher-priority groups at the front of the line @ @ @ @ @ @ @ away from the theatrics of Donald Trump .
On Tuesday , he opened a White House “ vaccine summit ” with a blast of falsehoods and boasts .
He then sat down and , for the cameras , signed an executive order , which he claimed would get what he called “ the American vaccine ” to “ American citizens , before sending it to other nations , ” but which was no more than a cross between a wild threat and a letter-to-Santa-like exercise in wishful thinking .
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as it is American , and the Trump Administration , which contracted to buy enough of the product to vaccinate fifty million people , apparently passed up a chance to preorder more .
( When George Stephanopoulos , of ABC , asked Moncef Slaoui , the director of Operation Warp Speed , if he could explain the executive order , Slaoui said , “ I literally don ’ t know.
” ) The F.D.A .
hearings were a reflection of what a crucial role the federal government has played and is playing in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be a similar hearing on Moderna ’ s , next week .
( Carolyn Kormann writes about that process in this week ’ s magazine . )
That is true even on days when Donald Trump makes the process look sordid .
The line of people waiting to get the vaccine was not the direct subject of the meeting ; nor were broader matters of equity in allocating it , although the committee looked at whether it appears to be safe across ethnic and racial groups .
( It does . )
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ background .
By the time it ’ s the turn of healthy teen-agers without other prioritizing factors to get vaccinated , months will likely have passed , and there will be even more information to examine .
In the present circumstances , one could imagine an alternative course of events in which the F.D.A.
, at a far more fraught hearing , had to consider a vaccine that was on the border of acceptability .
That didn ’ t happen ; our first option looks like a sound one .
“ It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you know everything , ” Dr. Offit , of the Children ’ s Hospital of Philadelphia , said .
“ The question is whether you know enough.
” And , in the view of the committee , we know more than enough about the Pfizer vaccine to get started .
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What kinds of space are we willing to live and work in now ?

There are things we still don’t know about the COVID-19 vaccine, but everything we do know looks good. Photograph by Ben Birchall / Pool / EPA-EFE / Shutterstock
An all-day hearing of the Food and Drug Administration’s vaccine advisory committee closed, on Thursday evening, with a vote to recommend an Emergency Use Authorization of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for people sixteen and older. The proceedings involved a great deal of data and technical talk, but might be quickly summarized this way: there are things we still do not know about the vaccine, but nothing that we do know looks bad. Indeed, the vaccine looks very, very good. And its known goodness applies to a diverse range of populations, including Black and Latinx and older people. An F.D.A. analysis of the raw data, released earlier this week, confirmed previous reports that the vaccine’s efficacy in preventing disease in trial participants was close to ninety-five per cent. That number held up under questioning from committee members, who represented a range of specialties, from pediatrics to virology, throughout the eight hours of the hearing. Amid a pandemic—on a day when more than three thousand people in this country were reported to have died from COVID-19—that result is far more than it would have been reasonable to hope for even a couple of months ago. As Dr. Doran Fink, of the F.D.A., said in one of the day’s presentations, there is no “adequate, approved, and available alternative.” It was a long day, but a reassuring and even energizing one.
Early Friday, the F.D.A. issued a statement saying that, given the positive recommendation, it would “rapidly work toward finalization and issuance” of an E.U.A. In other words, we may see the first person in this country—likely a nursing-care resident or a frontline health worker—being given the shot within a day or two. (The E.U.A. would allow the immediate use of a vaccine on an emergency basis, while a longer licensing process is pending.) The F.D.A. will not be the first to approve the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. On Tuesday, the United Kingdom began using it to vaccinate the residents and staff of nursing homes, and Canada approved it on Wednesday. The F.D.A. committee spent significant time on the news that two people in the U.K. had allergic reactions. According to British health authorities, both of them had enough of a history of serious reactions to other allergens that they carried EpiPens (or their generic equivalent) with them.
Some of the committee members appeared frustrated that there was not more specific information about the two cases, but part of their concern was that the news might discourage people who could safely take the vaccine from doing so. Dr. Paul Offit, a committee member who works on vaccine education at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, said, “This issue is not going to die until we have better data.” At the same time, both committee members and presenters—representatives of Pfizer and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention took part in the hearings, too—noted that many vaccines induce allergic reactions in a small number of people. As a result, there are tested options for keeping those people safe, from providing recipients with information sheets before they get a shot to insuring that the health-care professionals who administer the vaccines can respond to, for example, an anaphylactic reaction.
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Those and other factors that applied to groups with specific risks might, as Fink said, at another point, be “handled through labelling.” That said, the reactions that have emerged appear most often to be slight but distinct (and concentrated on the second day after vaccination). The most common was pain at the spot where the shot was given; others were fever, headache, and fatigue. In Pfizer’s Phase III trials, which included forty-three thousand subjects, those reactions were more often seen in younger participants. (The fear was that it could have been the opposite—some vaccines are tolerated badly by the elderly.) More severe adverse events were “few in number and comparable” between the vaccinated and the placebo groups, suggesting that they may not have been caused by the vaccine. (People do get sick in their normal lives.) There were some oddities that may be a sign of something to watch—during the trials, four cases of Bell’s palsy, or a slackening of the face muscles, emerged in the group that got the vaccine, and there were none in the group that got the placebo. Again, given the small incidence, it is hard to tell what that means. According to the information that the F.D.A. has, the number of cases among study participants is not out of line with that in the general population.
The average layperson watching the hearing for reasons to be confident in the vaccine—someone, that is, who might not know what to make of the gruesome 3-D rendering of a spike protein that showed up on one slide—could have found plenty of them. Indeed, there are indications that even one dose of the vaccine (the clinical trial involved two shots, three weeks apart) might offer some protection, a possibility that Pfizer will study further. There were also many reminders that these times are not, as one presenter put it, “normal.” Comments from the public, which constituted a segment of the hearings, came from people wary of vaccines, but also from a clinical-trial participant who compared the daily death tolls to a series of 9/11 attacks, and said that he was proud of the role he had played to help bring them to an end. And, of course, there was the patois of the COVID-19 videoconferencing era: “I’m trying to activate my video”; “I think you’re muted”; “Still can’t hear you, Amanda”; “I apologize, I’d accidentally muted you when I was trying to get off here. So I did not hear the question.”
Many of the concerns that did arise had to do with people who were not a part of the Pfizer study—most notably, children, pregnant women, and lactating women. (Twenty-three participating women did become pregnant during the clinical trial, and one who received the placebo had a miscarriage, but it is too early to tell how the vaccine might ultimately have affected those women or their babies.) But, despite the uncertainty, the wording of the recommendation did not exclude pregnant women. As Fink noted, in explaining why, many women with “childbearing potential” might be prioritized for vaccination—health-care workers, for example. The F.D.A.’s position, at this point, is that, when it comes to being vaccinated, those women should get to “make their own decision in conjunction with their health-care provider.”
Children are another matter. Trials for young people between the ages of twelve and fifteen are just beginning, and the information for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds is scarcer than for other age groups, because few participated in the early trials. The greatest moment of contention in the hearings concerned a proposal from Dr. Cody Meissner, a committee member affiliated with Tufts Children’s Hospital, in Boston, that the E.U.A. cover people eighteen and older, rather than sixteen and older. A number of committee members seconded that idea—Dr. Archana Chatterjee, of Rosalind Franklin University, in North Chicago, said a factor that, for her, weighed against authorizing the vaccine for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds now was that it wouldn’t be those young people themselves, but their parents, who would weigh the risks and make the decision. On the other side, Dr. Ofer Levy spoke about how important young people were to the pandemic’s “endgame.” Dr. Eric Rubin argued against excluding those teen-agers. “Some of these kids are working in supermarkets,” he said. “I hate to take that tool away from clinicians.”
After some more back-and-forth, Dr. Marion Gruber, of the F.D.A.’s Office of Vaccines Research and Review, suggested simply putting the proposal, with the language including sixteen-year-olds, to a vote. “I don’t want to vote against the E.U.A.,” Dr. Meissner said, as much as he’d like to see the language modified. He abstained, and the recommendation was approved, seventeen to four. (Dr. Chatterjee voted no.) Gruber, after one final videoconferencing snag—“We can’t hear you, Marion!”—thanked the members, and emphasized that the F.D.A. would take their concerns into account as it proceeded to the next stage. This is, after all, only an emergency-use authorization, and the scrutiny of the vaccine will continue, as will the clinical trials.
Early in the meeting, Dr. Steven Goodman, of Stanford, had noted that an ethical dilemma isn’t one that has a right answer and a wrong one—it is one for which there are two answers that might each be ethical in different ways. He was applying that point to another major subject of the hearings: whether people in the clinical trials who had received the placebo should be prioritized for receiving the vaccine. On the one hand, they had taken a risk to protect their communities, and so they deserved a spot near the front of the line. On the other, there are still things to learn from the clinical trials, which would be less useful if the control group essentially disappeared. (A basic idea of clinical trials is that participants do not know if they have received the placebo—learning that they had not been vaccinated would require “unblinding.”) One option that Pfizer suggested was giving the placebo recipients the real vaccine as they become eligible for it, even if that effectively meant putting an early end to their participation in the trial—for example, a teacher who was a trial volunteer would not be left behind when teachers became eligible. But she also would not leap ahead to join higher-priority groups at the front of the line.


newyorker--2020-12-11--Fighting COVID-19 in the Amazon, with Herbs and the Internet

When the coronavirus struck an indigenous community in the Ecuadorian Amazon , in April , the initial victims of the disease died without ever being tested .
The government ’ s response to this outbreak in the Secoya nation was sluggish—the first test results appeared two weeks after the first death .
The Secoya tribal president , Justino Piaguaje , accused the government of abandoning them to their fate in remote communities , surrounded by oil fields and palm plantations .
The tribe had just seven hundred members in Ecuador , so the death of an elder meant , in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ loved one , the disappearance of language , history , and cultural knowledge .
Jimmy Piaguaje , a filmmaker and the cousin of Justino ( all Secoya have the last name Piaguaje or Payaguaje ) , lost an uncle and a grandfather to the disease .
He said , “ We were afraid that we would go extinct.
” During the peak of the outbreak , when the morgues of Ecuador ’ s largest city , Guayaquil , were overflowing—and while indigenous communities attempted to quarantine—the oil , mining , and forestry industries @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In May , Ecuador ’ s coalition of indigenous governments , CONFENIAE , launched an online dashboard to track cases of the disease in indigenous communities and identify outbreaks so that medical brigades , PCR tests , and emergency kits could be directed to the places that needed them .
As of November , the dashboard had logged more than three thousand cases in ten indigenous nations .
Carlos Mazabanda , Amazon Watch ’ s field coördinator for Ecuador , who worked on creating the dashboard , said , “ In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , indigenous peoples were forced to take matters into their own hands.
” Justino , the Secoya tribal president , had the same reaction .
He said that the deaths of four elders in his community underscored the importance of keeping traditions alive , and one tradition stood out .
After it became clear that the outside world would not offer protection from COVID-19 , Secoya leaders decided to draw on the tribe ’ s history of medicinal plant use and develop their own treatment .
In August , a group assembled : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ activists from the N.G.O .
Amazon Frontlines , which has been helping indigenous groups in the upper Amazon respond to COVID , arranged to make the full-day river trip from the Secoya villages , in northeastern Ecuador , to the remote Lagartococha region , at the country ’ s eastern edge , to harvest local medicinal plants for a remedy .
Jimmy , the filmmaker , along with his best friend and collaborator , Ribaldo , were there to document the journey .
Lagartococha , a labyrinthine network of lagoons , slow-moving creeks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Secoya ’ s traditional homeland .
In the nineteen-forties , during a border dispute between Ecuador and Peru , the area was militarized and the Secoya were forced out on both sides of the border .
In recent years , Secoya have started returning to the area to fish , hunt , and gather wild plants .
The Amazon is often described—correctly—as being at an ecological tipping point .
Now the region is near a cultural tipping point , as well .
The forest is home to 1.6 million indigenous people , communities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ off of , the forest ’ s ecosystems .
Their survival becomes more tenuous as rivers are dammed and trees are clear-cut or burned to make way for agriculture and mineral extraction .
As the group sailed down the Aguarico River , in a craft shaped like a dugout canoe but motorized and made of fibreglass , they passed a barge loaded with giant gravel trucks being ferried deep into the forest to construct new roads .
When the boat turned onto a smaller channel , aerial footage taken from a drone operated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an improbably sharp line in the water , where the gray of the Aguarico gives way , abruptly , to blackwater dyed inky dark by decaying plants .
The flooded forests and lagoons of Lagartococha look like places outside of time , with tangles of woody lianas and layers of foliage that appear as they have for thousands of years .
When the group arrived , members set up the camp that would serve as their home base for three days and began harvesting herbs and bitter barks .
Alfredo Payaguaje , a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ each plant—an herb called umu ’ co , or cat ’ s claw , to help with fever ; a wild ginger to relieve a cough ; the bitter bark of the cinchona tree , full of quinine , to alleviate inflammation .
He likened the forest to an open-air market : “ There are things you eat , you build with , remedies.
” Tribal leaders and activists have told me that COVID-19 is an “ existential threat ” to the indigenous peoples of the Amazon , one with a disturbing resemblance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decimated the people of the Americas , hundreds of years ago , when European settlers first arrived .
Mazabanda , of Amazon Watch , also sees an indication of contemporary politics in the way that the pandemic has played out in Ecuador : “ The truth is that the government views indigenous peoples as obstacles to unrestricted access to the vast natural resources of the Amazon.
” This is evident , he told me , in “ the lack of emergency government support for indigenous peoples and the reckless designation of extractive industries @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the trip to Lagartococha , Secoya leaders distributed the herbal treatment among their citizens and to neighboring indigenous groups .
Though not a cure , the tribal medicine helps alleviate COVID-19 symptoms .
Jimmy said that sharing the treatments—like sharing his film about the expedition—has a dual purpose .
In addition to helping people get through the illness , he said , “ Our medicine will help make the world aware that the indigenous world still has much to share , that we have a lot of knowledge.
” Jimmy and Justino ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the ecosystem of the Amazon is more valuable intact than stripped for parts but that its inhabitants ’ history , culture , and medicine have vast importance , as well .
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Indigenous groups in Ecuador have been finding ways to trace and treat COVID-19.
When the coronavirus struck an indigenous community in the Ecuadorian Amazon, in April, the initial victims of the disease died without ever being tested. The government’s response to this outbreak in the Secoya nation was sluggish—the first test results appeared two weeks after the first death. The Secoya tribal president, Justino Piaguaje, accused the government of abandoning them to their fate in remote communities, surrounded by oil fields and palm plantations. The tribe had just seven hundred members in Ecuador, so the death of an elder meant, in addition to the personal loss of a loved one, the disappearance of language, history, and cultural knowledge. Jimmy Piaguaje, a filmmaker and the cousin of Justino (all Secoya have the last name Piaguaje or Payaguaje), lost an uncle and a grandfather to the disease. He said, “We were afraid that we would go extinct.”
During the peak of the outbreak, when the morgues of Ecuador’s largest city, Guayaquil, were overflowing—and while indigenous communities attempted to quarantine—the oil, mining, and forestry industries continued to work in the rain forest. In May, Ecuador’s coalition of indigenous governments, CONFENIAE, launched an online dashboard to track cases of the disease in indigenous communities and identify outbreaks so that medical brigades, PCR tests, and emergency kits could be directed to the places that needed them. As of November, the dashboard had logged more than three thousand cases in ten indigenous nations. Carlos Mazabanda, Amazon Watch’s field coördinator for Ecuador, who worked on creating the dashboard, said, “In the absence of a response from the government, indigenous peoples were forced to take matters into their own hands.”
Justino, the Secoya tribal president, had the same reaction. He said that the deaths of four elders in his community underscored the importance of keeping traditions alive, and one tradition stood out. After it became clear that the outside world would not offer protection from COVID-19, Secoya leaders decided to draw on the tribe’s history of medicinal plant use and develop their own treatment.
In August, a group assembled: Justino, experienced herbalists, and two activists from the N.G.O. Amazon Frontlines, which has been helping indigenous groups in the upper Amazon respond to COVID, arranged to make the full-day river trip from the Secoya villages, in northeastern Ecuador, to the remote Lagartococha region, at the country’s eastern edge, to harvest local medicinal plants for a remedy. Jimmy, the filmmaker, along with his best friend and collaborator, Ribaldo, were there to document the journey. Lagartococha, a labyrinthine network of lagoons, slow-moving creeks, and flooded forests, is the Secoya’s traditional homeland. In the nineteen-forties, during a border dispute between Ecuador and Peru, the area was militarized and the Secoya were forced out on both sides of the border. In recent years, Secoya have started returning to the area to fish, hunt, and gather wild plants.
The Amazon is often described—correctly—as being at an ecological tipping point. Now the region is near a cultural tipping point, as well. The forest is home to 1.6 million indigenous people, communities that have long managed, and lived off of, the forest’s ecosystems. Their survival becomes more tenuous as rivers are dammed and trees are clear-cut or burned to make way for agriculture and mineral extraction. As the group sailed down the Aguarico River, in a craft shaped like a dugout canoe but motorized and made of fibreglass, it passed a barge loaded with giant gravel trucks being ferried deep into the forest to construct new roads.
When the boat turned onto a smaller channel, aerial footage taken from a drone operated by the Secoya team showed it crossing an improbably sharp line in the water, where the gray of the Aguarico gives way, abruptly, to blackwater dyed inky dark by decaying plants. The flooded forests and lagoons of Lagartococha look like places outside of time, with tangles of woody lianas and layers of foliage that appear as they have for thousands of years. When the group arrived, members set up the camp that would serve as their home base for three days and began harvesting herbs and bitter barks. Alfredo Payaguaje, a Secoya herbalist, described the functions of each plant—an herb called umu’co, or cat’s claw, to help with fever; a wild ginger to relieve a cough; the bitter bark of the cinchona tree, full of quinine, to alleviate inflammation. He likened the forest to an open-air market: “There are things you eat, you build with, remedies.”
Tribal leaders and activists have told me that COVID-19 is an “existential threat” to the indigenous peoples of the Amazon, one with a disturbing resemblance to the wave of infectious disease that decimated the people of the Americas, hundreds of years ago, when European settlers first arrived. Mazabanda, of Amazon Watch, also sees an indication of contemporary politics in the way that the pandemic has played out in Ecuador: “The truth is that the government views indigenous peoples as obstacles to unrestricted access to the vast natural resources of the Amazon.” This is evident, he told me, in “the lack of emergency government support for indigenous peoples and the reckless designation of extractive industries as ‘essential services.’ ”
After the trip to Lagartococha, Secoya leaders distributed the herbal treatment among their citizens and to neighboring indigenous groups. Though not a cure, the tribal medicine helps alleviate COVID-19 symptoms. Jimmy said that sharing the treatments—like sharing his film about the expedition—has a dual purpose. In addition to helping people get through the illness, he said, “Our medicine will help make the world aware that the indigenous world still has much to share, that we have a lot of knowledge.” Jimmy and Justino’s group aims to demonstrate not just that the ecosystem of the Amazon is more valuable intact than stripped for parts but that its inhabitants’ history, culture, and medicine have vast importance as well.
More on the Coronavirus


newyorker--2020-12-11--Where We Stand on Climate

Where We Stand on Climate

Subscribers to The Climate Crisis newsletter received this piece in their in-boxes .
Sign up to receive future installments .
All discussions of the climate crisis start with science , and the science is grim .
Despite a La Niña wave cooling the global temperature in 2020 , this year will vie for the hottest on record .
It ’ s already seen what could be the highest temperature ever reliably recorded ( a hundred and thirty degrees , in California ) , and devastating wildfires in Australia , Siberia , the American West , and South America , where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the largest wetland on earth , burned .
Thirty named storms formed in the Atlantic , leading to a record hurricane season .
But those dramatic moments obscure the more devastating and silent changes .
The Australia-based climatologist Andrew Glikson recently catalogued some of them for Arctic News : over the past four decades , the globe ’ s tropical zones have expanded by about two degrees latitude .
The “ shift of climate zones toward the poles , ” Glikson writes , “ is changing the geography of the planet.
” June @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Verkhoyansk , Siberia , likely the highest ever recorded above the Arctic Circle .
As northern sea ice melts , the jet stream weakens , allowing warm air masses to penetrate farther north ; one result this year has been the fires in Siberia—which began burning the peatlands that hold huge stores of carbon .
In Australia , the tropical zone of the north is pushing farther south , and the coastal population centers are ever hotter and drier .
The implacable rise of the oceans is accelerating , and some of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ planet seem at tipping points : in the Amazon , where deforestation is escalating under Jair Bolsonaro ’ s Brazilian government , researchers say that a twenty- to twenty-five-per-cent loss of forest cover could trigger large areas of the forest to become savannah ; at the moment , the figure is about seventeen per cent .
People caused the climate crisis , of course , but the definition of which people gets more precise over time .
Research indicates that the wealthiest ten per cent of the world ’ s population—those with net @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for more than half of all carbon emissions .
The wealthiest one per cent produce more than twice the carbon that the poorest fifty per cent do .
But the effects of climate change are unjustly reversed : the less you did to cause it , the sooner and harder you feel its effects .
Last month , when Hurricanes Eta and Iota hit Central America , the damage was “ beyond compare , ” Admiral Craig Faller , of the U.S. Southern Command , which was helping relief efforts , told the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of up to a decade just to recover , ” he said .
Before then , displaced Hondurans and Guatemalans may trek in large numbers to the southern border of the United States , the Times reports , presenting a test for a Biden Administration that “ may find it politically difficult to welcome a surge of migrants.
” Those migrants would only be , however , part of an advance guard ; estimates for the number of climate migrants around the world by 2050 range between twenty-five million and a billion people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ temperature is increasing steadily and at a pace scientists had predicted .
( The latest figures from Columbia University ’ s James Hansen and other climate scientists suggest an acceleration of warming over the past few years . )
“ We have entered a new climate , ” the meteorologist Jeff Masters , a contributor to Yale Climate Connections , said last week .
“ Heat is energy and when everything else comes together , ” he added , “ things are going to go bonkers.
” Given the pace of physical change @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can move to counter it .
So far , the signs are not encouraging : emissions of carbon dioxide and methane continued to rise through 2019 .
They dipped in 2020 , during the pandemic shutdowns , but the curve is now back on the upswing .
Still , we do seem to be approaching an inflection point—a peak in the burning of hydrocarbons—that the pandemic may have moved forward a little .
For a decade , engineers have been steadily driving down the cost of solar and wind power and of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is now the cheapest power in the world , which opens up possibilities that didn ’ t previously exist for rapid and mass-scale change ; electric cars , to give one example , are quickly transitioning from expensive toys to cheaper , better consumer products .
Joe Biden , in other words , has far more scope for decisive action than Barack Obama did , just four years ago , though a Senate left in Majority Leader Mitch McConnell ’ s hands would make acting on that opportunity difficult .
You can tell @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a variety of leaders—in politics and business—have begun making new promises .
“ 2050 ” has become a rallying cry , as in , “ by 2050 , we ’ ll be net zero ” or “ by 2050 , we ’ ll be carbon-neutral.
” China made such a pledge this fall and , though it chose 2060 as its deadline , that was nevertheless a huge change in policy .
But both timelines are too slow .
Since physics sets the terms of this debate , we need scientists , not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we need to hit , and here the numbers are stark .
In Paris , in 2015 , the world committed to trying to hold the increase in global temperature to as close as possible to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels .
Last week , the World Meteorological Organization said that the current rise stands at 1.2 degrees , with at least a one-in-five chance that we will see an annual average above 1.5 degrees before 2024 .
Two years ago , the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that , to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ target , we ’ d need to see a “ fundamental societal and systems transitions and transformations ” of energy systems by 2030 , which it defined as cutting emissions by half .
2030 is now nine years away .
That ’ s thirty-six quarters of a business cycle , one-and-a-half Senate terms in Washington , or nearly two five-year plans for Beijing ; new data show that to meet that target our fossil-fuel production has to drop at least six per cent a year .
But our leverage over where the earth @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with each passing year , because feedback loops beyond our control are starting to intervene .
For example , America ’ s emissions from transportation fell sharply during the pandemic , but that entire decline has been erased by the carbon released in the brutal fires in the West .
So the right metaphor for where we are now is a race—one that we are losing .
We can ’ t actually win it , in the sense that we ’ ve already done so much damage , and far more is locked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ if we act with daring and haste in the decade ahead , we can still achieve a world in which the temperature rises by two degrees Celsius or less , instead of by three or four or more—and that could easily make the difference between a civilization that survives and one that collapses .
The key contestants in this race are the fossil-fuel industry and the movements that have arisen to stop it .
The balance of power between them determines how bravely politicians will act and how fast investment will switch to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doubt about the eventual outcome : economics will dictate a switch to renewable power .
But waiting for economics to take its course guarantees that we will not make our deadlines .
That ’ s precisely why activists have been fighting so many battles on so many fronts .
Some of the most important , I think , include the fights to prevent new fossil-fuel infrastructure , such as pipelines .
There was a win on that front last week , as Bill de Blasio , the mayor of New York , joined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fracked-gas pipeline .
And there was a setback , as the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission gave the go-ahead for the Canadian Line 3 tar-sands pipeline crossing the state ; campaigners led by indigenous activists blockaded that work last Friday .
There are also crucial fights to cut off the financing to the fossil-fuel industry : Stop the Money Pipeline ( a campaign that I helped launch ) has had some initial success in pressuring big banks , asset managers , and insurance companies to cease underwriting coal and oil and gas .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the major U.S. banks to declare the Arctic off-limits for oil lending . )
The fossil-fuel divestment campaign has seen some major victories , too : on Wednesday , the New York State comptroller announced plans to divest the state ’ s pension fund , one of the largest in the world .
There are also campaigns for a “ fossil-fuel non-proliferation treaty , ” which just last week scored a success , when Denmark announced that it would not license any new drilling in the North Sea .
And there are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ firms to stop green-washing the industry .
All these campaigns are most pointed in Europe , but they are spreading around the world .

Subscribers to The Climate Crisis newsletter received this piece in their in-boxes. Sign up to receive future installments.
I’ve been writing this column for almost a year now, trying to shine a light on many of the climate crisis’s facets. Once in a while, it’s important to pull back and try to put it all in perspective. Now is such a time: this month marks the fifth anniversary of the Paris climate summit; we’ve more or less survived the Trump Administration, with an incoming Administration promising a new approach; and we’re less than a year away from what will be the next great global climate meeting, in Glasgow, Scotland. (On a personal note, I’m subsiding into emeritus status at 350.org, the climate campaign I helped found, and I turn sixty this week—since I started writing my first book about all this when I was twenty-seven, this milestone means that I’ve spent four-fifths of my adult life wrestling with the climate problem.) Where do we stand? Take a deep breath.
All discussions of the climate crisis start with science, and the science is grim. Despite a La Niña wave cooling the global temperature in 2020, this year will vie for the hottest on record. It’s already seen what could be the highest temperature ever reliably recorded (a hundred and thirty degrees, in California), and devastating wildfires in Australia, Siberia, the American West, and South America, where about a quarter of the Pantanal, the largest wetland on earth, burned. Thirty named storms formed in the Atlantic, leading to a record hurricane season.
But those dramatic moments obscure the more devastating and silent changes. The Australia-based climatologist Andrew Glikson recently catalogued some of them for Arctic News: over the past four decades, the globe’s tropical zones have expanded by about two degrees latitude. The “shift of climate zones toward the poles,” Glikson writes, “is changing the geography of the planet.” June saw the temperature top a hundred degrees in Verkhoyansk, Siberia, likely the highest ever recorded above the Arctic Circle. As northern sea ice melts, the jet stream weakens, allowing warm air masses to penetrate farther north; one result this year has been the fires in Siberia—which began burning the peatlands that hold huge stores of carbon. In Australia, the tropical zone of the north is pushing farther south, and the coastal population centers are ever hotter and drier. The implacable rise of the oceans is accelerating, and some of the most important physical systems on the planet seem at tipping points: in the Amazon, where deforestation is escalating under Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazilian government, researchers say that a twenty- to twenty-five-per-cent loss of forest cover could trigger large areas of the forest to become savannah; at the moment, the figure is about seventeen per cent.
People caused the climate crisis, of course, but the definition of which people gets more precise over time. Research indicates that the wealthiest ten per cent of the world’s population—those with net incomes above thirty-eight thousand dollars a year—account for more than half of all carbon emissions. The wealthiest one per cent produce more than twice the carbon that the poorest fifty per cent do. But the effects of climate change are unjustly reversed: the less you did to cause it, the sooner and harder you feel its effects. Last month, when Hurricanes Eta and Iota hit Central America, the damage was “beyond compare,” Admiral Craig Faller, of the U.S. Southern Command, which was helping relief efforts, told the Times. “There are some estimates of up to a decade just to recover,” he said. Before then, displaced Hondurans and Guatemalans may trek in large numbers to the southern border of the United States, the Times reports, presenting a test for a Biden Administration that “may find it politically difficult to welcome a surge of migrants.” Those migrants would only be, however, part of an advance guard; estimates for the number of climate migrants around the world by 2050 range between twenty-five million and a billion people.
To put it simply, the temperature is increasing steadily and at a pace scientists had predicted. (The latest figures from Columbia University’s James Hansen and other climate scientists suggest an acceleration of warming over the past few years.) “We have entered a new climate,” the meteorologist Jeff Masters, a contributor to Yale Climate Connections, said last week. “Heat is energy and when everything else comes together,” he added, “things are going to go bonkers.”
Given the pace of physical change, the question becomes how fast societies can move to counter it. So far, the signs are not encouraging: emissions of carbon dioxide and methane continued to rise through 2019. They dipped in 2020, during the pandemic shutdowns, but the curve is now back on the upswing. Still, we do seem to be approaching an inflection point—a peak in the burning of hydrocarbons—that the pandemic may have moved forward a little. For a decade, engineers have been steadily driving down the cost of solar and wind power and of the batteries required to store it. This is now the cheapest power in the world, which opens up possibilities that didn’t previously exist for rapid and mass-scale change; electric cars, to give one example, are quickly transitioning from expensive toys to cheaper, better consumer products. Joe Biden, in other words, has far more scope for decisive action than Barack Obama did, just four years ago, though a Senate left in Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s hands would make acting on that opportunity difficult.
You can tell that something’s shifting, because a variety of leaders—in politics and business—have begun making new promises. “2050” has become a rallying cry, as in, “by 2050, we’ll be net zero” or “by 2050, we’ll be carbon-neutral.” China made such a pledge this fall and, though it chose 2060 as its deadline, that was nevertheless a huge change in policy. But both timelines are too slow. Since physics sets the terms of this debate, we need scientists, not politicians, to tell us the pace we need to hit, and here the numbers are stark. In Paris, in 2015, the world committed to trying to hold the increase in global temperature to as close as possible to 1.5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels. Last week, the World Meteorological Organization said that the current rise stands at 1.2 degrees, with at least a one-in-five chance that we will see an annual average above 1.5 degrees before 2024.
Two years ago, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that, to have any chance of meeting that Paris target, we’d need to see a “fundamental societal and systems transitions and transformations” of energy systems by 2030, which it defined as cutting emissions by half. 2030 is now nine years away. That’s thirty-six quarters of a business cycle, one-and-a-half Senate terms in Washington, or nearly two five-year plans for Beijing; new data show that to meet that target our fossil-fuel production has to drop at least six per cent a year. But our leverage over where the earth’s temperature will eventually settle dwindles with each passing year, because feedback loops beyond our control are starting to intervene. For example, America’s emissions from transportation fell sharply during the pandemic, but that entire decline has been erased by the carbon released in the brutal fires in the West.
So the right metaphor for where we are now is a race—one that we are losing. We can’t actually win it, in the sense that we’ve already done so much damage, and far more is locked in for the future. But, if we act with daring and haste in the decade ahead, we can still achieve a world in which the temperature rises by two degrees Celsius or less, instead of by three or four or more—and that could easily make the difference between a civilization that survives and one that collapses.
The key contestants in this race are the fossil-fuel industry and the movements that have arisen to stop it. The balance of power between them determines how bravely politicians will act and how fast investment will switch to renewable energy. There’s no doubt about the eventual outcome: economics will dictate a switch to renewable power. But waiting for economics to take its course guarantees that we will not make our deadlines. That’s precisely why activists have been fighting so many battles on so many fronts. Some of the most important, I think, include the fights to prevent new fossil-fuel infrastructure, such as pipelines. There was a win on that front last week, as Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York, joined other officials in opposing the North Brooklyn fracked-gas pipeline. And there was a setback, as the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission gave the go-ahead for the Canadian Line 3 tar-sands pipeline crossing the state; campaigners led by indigenous activists blockaded that work last Friday.


newyorker--2020-12-11--White House Offers Curbside Pickup of Pardons

WASHINGTON ( The Borowitz Report ) —In response to the coronavirus pandemic , the White House is offering curbside pickup @ @ @ @ @ cronies who have ordered pardons from Donald J. Trump .
The White House made the @ @ @ @ @ pardon-pickup option to accommodate the surging number of stooges and lackeys who have been shopping @ @ @ @ @ .
Republicans looking to pick up their pardons may do so at a drive-through window @ @ @ @ @ eight in the morning until nine at night , the White House announced .
Donald @ @ @ @ @ will personally dispense the pardons through the window , enabling pardon-seekers to remain safely in @ @ @ @ @ House press secretary , Kayleigh McEnany , urged Trump ’ s toadying enablers to pick @ @ @ @ @ as possible .
“ Get your pardon first thing in the morning , and you @ @ @ @ @ of time to get to the Supreme Court to try to throw out the election @ @ @ @ @

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—In response to the coronavirus pandemic, the White House is offering curbside pickup for Republican officials and other cronies who have ordered pardons from Donald J. Trump.
The White House made the decision to offer the contactless pardon-pickup option to accommodate the surging number of stooges and lackeys who have been shopping for pardons this holiday season.
Republicans looking to pick up their pardons may do so at a drive-through window outside the Oval Office from eight in the morning until nine at night, the White House announced.
Donald J. Trump or Mike Pence will personally dispense the pardons through the window, enabling pardon-seekers to remain safely in their cars.
The White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, urged Trump’s toadying enablers to pick up their pardons as early as possible. “Get your pardon first thing in the morning, and you’ll still have plenty of time to get to the Supreme Court to try to throw out the election,” she said.


newyorker--2020-12-11--Lorraine Bracco Bought an Italian Villa, but She Can’t Escape “The Sopranos”

In early 2019 , a piece of news threw daydreaming Americans into a frenzy .
A small and dilapidated Sicilian town , Sambuca , was hoping to address its dwindling population and flagging tourist economy .
As an experiment , it would begin selling off a number of abandoned homes for the titillating price of one euro .
There was a catch , of course : to purchase one of the homes , buyers had to put down an additional five-thousand-euro deposit , and promise to spend at least fifteen thousand euros renovating the property over a period of three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t happen , they would lose their deposits—and the houses .
Still , it seemed like a reasonable price to start afresh in Old World Italy .
Within weeks , Sambuca ’ s municipal department had received more than a hundred thousand e-mails inquiring about the homes .
One of these inquiries came from Lorraine Bracco , the Italian-American actress best known for her roles in America ’ s fictional mobster ecosystem .
Bracco played Karen Hill , the erratic wife of Ray Liotta ’ s Henry Hill , in Martin Scorsese ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
At the end of that decade , she popped up in a much more subdued and significant part , as Dr. Melfi , Tony Soprano ’ s demure and righteous psychiatrist .
Bracco ’ s grandparents hail from Sicily , but , until recently , she had never been there .
Once she learned about the houses in Sambuca , she reached out to an HGTV executive and pitched him a show that was part home-renovation diary , part returning-to-her-roots documentary .
The result , “ My Big Italian Adventure , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ follows Bracco , sixty-six , as she becomes the lucky owner of an Italian villa—and as she realizes , almost immediately , how hard it will be to yank the house into the twenty-first century .
The building is more than two hundred years old and will need close to a full gutting .
To further complicate things , Bracco has also decided to acquire the house next door .
Despite being about a dream home , the show can have the aspect of a nightmare .
As old walls turn to rubble @ @ @ @ @ @ @ house is a shithole.
” At one point , she admits , tearfully , “ I ’ m starting to be a little overwhelmed and a little scared.
” Bracco is especially fixated on turning the home ’ s lower level into a Ping-Pong room for her grandchildren ; she ’ s so enamored with the idea , and with Ping-Pong , that she has her table shipped all the way from New York .
She also has noble plans to retain as much of the home ’ s original details as possible—a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tension between Bracco and her dutiful Italian contractor , Piero .
Eventually , Piero tells Bracco that it ’ s an Italian tradition to involve a homeowner in the construction process , and he gets her to work plastering walls .
( He later confesses that no such tradition exists . )
The entire process is so stressful that we take some necessary detours from the renovation , following Bracco on a field trip to an olive farm , where she is disappointed to learn that she will not be served wine .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the property is slowly transformed into a picturesque little home , full of exposed stone , salvaged tile , and jaw-dropping views of the Sicilian countryside .
Bracco is not a household name , yet her place in the American imagination somehow justifies the extravagance of “ My Big Italian Adventure.
” In fact , the show echoes , in its way , several themes from “ The Sopranos , ” which remains utterly beloved twenty years after its début .
There are dedicated “ Sopranos ” -meme accounts and an entire industry @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2019 , a “ Sopranos ” convention was held in New Jersey , where the show is set .
Three of the series ’ most adored stars—Michael Imperioli , Steve Schirripa , and Drea de Matteo—make podcasts about “ The Sopranos.
” None of these ventures are particularly novel or well executed , but they all allow us to continue living in the fantasy world created by the show .
Its story lines and even its vernacular have become a sort of pop-culture lingua franca .
You might have to go all the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The shadow of “ Sopranos ” fandom is what makes “ My Big Italian Adventure ” such a captivating idea .
The series leans into Bracco ’ s professional history— “ Sopranos ” and “ Goodfellas ” title cards flash by in the opening credits—and sates our desire to spend more time with a version of Dr. Melfi , who , in the show , acts as Tony ’ s surrogate conscience .
One of the most compelling undercurrents of “ The Sopranos ” was how it navigated the tension between different groups @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the working-class members who encircle the Mafia , say—and mined the various forms of longing for the Old Country .
When Tony goes on a diatribe about the early waves of enterprising Italian immigrants in America , who “ had the balls ” to take what they wanted , Melfi offers one of her most withering responses : “ What do poor Italian immigrants have to do with you and what happens every morning when you step out of bed ?
” In real life , Bracco is more sympathetic to the bond @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s brassy and kooky , presenting more as someone who would befriend a Tony Soprano-like figure than treat him medically .
This contrast—and the notion of an alternate-universe Melfi—is what makes “ My Big Italian Adventure ” so much fun , despite its otherwise boilerplate premise .
Bracco loves to curse , make inappropriate interjections , and scream “ Ay-yi-yi-yi !
” after a construction setback .
She always seems a bit drunk , or at least drunk with enthusiasm .
One gets the sense that the locals she encounters see her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
She amuses us , too , but she also exudes a real care for the history and homeland she is only just getting to know .
At one point , she suggests that she wants to move to Sambuca full time , and not just create a vacation home there .
Given the context , this lends the show a sense of pathos .
“ My Big Italian Adventure ” was filmed before COVID-19 ravaged Italy , and the pandemic has all but decimated the country ’ s tourism industry .
Revitalization @ @ @ @ @ @ @ towns .
In June , a Calabrian town called Cinquefrondi announced its own one-euro home marketplace , modelled after Sambuca ’ s .
( It advertised itself , chillingly , as “ COVID-free.
” ) Bracco ’ s show underscores just how challenging such experiments can be , but it also depicts the value in making the past whole again .
As Piero tells Bracco , buying something new is easy : “ It takes a lot more effort to save something.
” Obsessives will know that this is the spirit of “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ breathe new life into old ways , and to find oneself in the process .
• Ian Crouch recounts the best jokes of the year .
• Sheldon Pearce on the albums that helped him navigate a lost plague year .
• New Yorker writers on the best books they read this year .
• Amanda Petrusich counts down the best music .

In early 2019, a piece of news threw daydreaming Americans into a frenzy. A small and dilapidated Sicilian town, Sambuca, was hoping to address its dwindling population and flagging tourist economy. As an experiment, it would begin selling off a number of abandoned homes for the titillating price of one euro. There was a catch, of course: to purchase one of the homes, buyers had to put down an additional five-thousand-euro deposit, and promise to spend at least fifteen thousand euros renovating the property over a period of three years. If the renovations didn’t happen, they would lose their deposits—and the houses. Still, it seemed like a reasonable price to start afresh in Old World Italy. Within weeks, Sambuca’s municipal department had received more than a hundred thousand e-mails inquiring about the homes.
One of these inquiries came from Lorraine Bracco, the Italian-American actress best known for her roles in America’s fictional mobster ecosystem. Bracco played Karen Hill, the erratic wife of Ray Liotta’s Henry Hill, in Martin Scorsese’s “Goodfellas,” from 1990. At the end of that decade, she popped up in a much more subdued and significant part, as Dr. Melfi, Tony Soprano’s demure and righteous psychiatrist. Bracco’s grandparents hail from Sicily, but, until recently, she had never been there. Once she learned about the houses in Sambuca, she reached out to an HGTV executive and pitched him a show that was part home-renovation diary, part returning-to-her-roots documentary. The result, “My Big Italian Adventure,” began airing in October. The show follows Bracco, sixty-six, as she becomes the lucky owner of an Italian villa—and as she realizes, almost immediately, how hard it will be to yank the house into the twenty-first century. The building is more than two hundred years old and will need close to a full gutting. To further complicate things, Bracco has also decided to acquire the house next door.
2020 in Review New Yorker writers reflect on the year’s highs and lows.
Despite being about a dream home, the show can have the aspect of a nightmare. As old walls turn to rubble, Bracco exclaims, “My whole house is a shithole.” At one point, she admits, tearfully, “I’m starting to be a little overwhelmed and a little scared.” Bracco is especially fixated on turning the home’s lower level into a Ping-Pong room for her grandchildren; she’s so enamored with the idea, and with Ping-Pong, that she has her table shipped all the way from New York. She also has noble plans to retain as much of the home’s original details as possible—a goal that becomes a constant source of tension between Bracco and her dutiful Italian contractor, Piero. Eventually, Piero tells Bracco that it’s an Italian tradition to involve a homeowner in the construction process, and he gets her to work plastering walls. (He later confesses that no such tradition exists.) The entire process is so stressful that we take some necessary detours from the renovation, following Bracco on a field trip to an olive farm, where she is disappointed to learn that she will not be served wine. Eventually, despite the constant hurdles, the property is slowly transformed into a picturesque little home, full of exposed stone, salvaged tile, and jaw-dropping views of the Sicilian countryside.
Bracco is not a household name, yet her place in the American imagination somehow justifies the extravagance of “My Big Italian Adventure.” In fact, the show echoes, in its way, several themes from “The Sopranos,” which remains utterly beloved twenty years after its début. There are dedicated “Sopranos”-meme accounts and an entire industry of “Sopranos” merchandise; in 2019, a “Sopranos” convention was held in New Jersey, where the show is set. Three of the series’ most adored stars—Michael Imperioli, Steve Schirripa, and Drea de Matteo—make podcasts about “The Sopranos.” None of these ventures are particularly novel or well executed, but they all allow us to continue living in the fantasy world created by the show. Its story lines and even its vernacular have become a sort of pop-culture lingua franca. You might have to go all the way to Italy to escape it.
The shadow of “Sopranos” fandom is what makes “My Big Italian Adventure” such a captivating idea. The series leans into Bracco’s professional history—“Sopranos” and “Goodfellas” title cards flash by in the opening credits—and sates our desire to spend more time with a version of Dr. Melfi, who, in the show, acts as Tony’s surrogate conscience. One of the most compelling undercurrents of “The Sopranos” was how it navigated the tension between different groups of Italian-Americans—the highfalutin, upper-crust assimilators and the working-class members who encircle the Mafia, say—and mined the various forms of longing for the Old Country. When Tony goes on a diatribe about the early waves of enterprising Italian immigrants in America, who “had the balls” to take what they wanted, Melfi offers one of her most withering responses: “What do poor Italian immigrants have to do with you and what happens every morning when you step out of bed?”
In real life, Bracco is more sympathetic to the bond between Italian-Americans and their ancestors. She’s brassy and kooky, presenting more as someone who would befriend a Tony Soprano-like figure than treat him medically. This contrast—and the notion of an alternate-universe Melfi—is what makes “My Big Italian Adventure” so much fun, despite its otherwise boilerplate premise. Bracco loves to curse, make inappropriate interjections, and scream “Ay-yi-yi-yi!” after a construction setback. She always seems a bit drunk, or at least drunk with enthusiasm. One gets the sense that the locals she encounters see her as a source of constant future amusement.
She amuses us, too, but she also exudes a real care for the history and homeland she is only just getting to know. At one point, she suggests that she wants to move to Sambuca full time, and not just create a vacation home there. Given the context, this lends the show a sense of pathos. “My Big Italian Adventure” was filmed before COVID-19 ravaged Italy, and the pandemic has all but decimated the country’s tourism industry. Revitalization has become especially urgent in small Italian towns. In June, a Calabrian town called Cinquefrondi announced its own one-euro home marketplace, modelled after Sambuca’s. (It advertised itself, chillingly, as “COVID-free.”) Bracco’s show underscores just how challenging such experiments can be, but it also depicts the value in making the past whole again. As Piero tells Bracco, buying something new is easy: “It takes a lot more effort to save something.” Obsessives will know that this is the spirit of “The Sopranos,” too—a desire to breathe new life into old ways, and to find oneself in the process.
2020 in Review


newyorker--2020-12-12--Who Gets the Vaccine, and in What Order?: A Comprehensive List

There ’ s a vaccine—several , actually .
“ Interesting , ” you say .
“ Gim me .
” Hold on there , tiger .
The question of who should be immunized first , and who should have to wait , is a big one .
The prioritization of one individual ’ s health over another ’ s is a complex and morally fraught process , wherein merit and societal worth are calibrated on a grand scale .
It is a daunting task .
Neither Project Warp Speed , nor individual states , has announced the order in which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Not to worry .
I ’ ve taken care of it .
You ’ re welcome .
3 .
Freelance writers who have been so disciplined about their pizza consumption during the pandemic that they have , in fact , lost 2.3 pounds .
14 .
The smart teachers who waited to see how the vaccine affected that first batch of teachers .
15 .
Whoever produces “ The Crown.
” In fact , everyone at Netflix , and the staff of Hulu and Amazon Prime , too .
Basically , anyone insuring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a book again .
17 .
The T.S.A .
and D.H.S .
( Safety first , no ?
No !
We need to GTFO . )
19 .
The less good-looking , but those of us really putting in the effort .
24 .
Anyone who just completed an impressive parallel park—come on , did you see that ?

There’s a vaccine—several, actually. “Interesting,” you say. “Gimme.” Hold on there, tiger. The question of who should be immunized first, and who should have to wait, is a big one. The prioritization of one individual’s health over another’s is a complex and morally fraught process, wherein merit and societal worth are calibrated on a grand scale. It is a daunting task. Neither Project Warp Speed, nor individual states, has announced the order in which the coronavirus vaccine will be distributed. Not to worry. I’ve taken care of it. You’re welcome.
1. Doctors, obviously—they work on the front lines every day, keeping us safe.
2. The elderly, who are most at risk.
3. Freelance writers who have been so disciplined about their pizza consumption during the pandemic that they have, in fact, lost 2.3 pounds.
4. Nurses and E.M.T.s.
5. Firefighters.
6. Charli D’Amelio.
7. Teachers.
8. Less popular elderly people whom we’re kind of on the fence about.
9. Farmers.
10. Clergy.
11. Any persons involved in delivering the PlayStation 5 in a safe and timely manner.
12. Bartenders.
13. Professional athletes.
14. The smart teachers who waited to see how the vaccine affected that first batch of teachers.
15. Whoever produces “The Crown.” In fact, everyone at Netflix, and the staff of Hulu and Amazon Prime, too. Basically, anyone insuring that we never have to pick up a book again.
16. Pilots.
17. The T.S.A. and D.H.S. (Safety first, no? No! We need to GTFO.)
18. The good-looking.
19. The less good-looking, but those of us really putting in the effort.
20. Pharmacists, starting with the lax ones.
21. Santa.
22. Butchers, bakers, Fenty Beauty Match Stix makers.
23. Dentists, ophthalmologists, podiatrists—those medical specialists whose office we leave thinking, That money could have gone to a massage.
24. Anyone who just completed an impressive parallel park—come on, did you see that?
25. Polic—or let’s just say “civil servants,” and leave it at that.
26. Most everybody else.
27. Grad students.
28. Dogs, just in case.
29. Those guys (it’s always guys) who drive extra-noisy motorbikes.
30. Fashion people, whom, it turns out, we didn’t need after all.
31. NXIVM members.
32. Life coaches.
33. My exes, but not Jennifer, because I don’t even think about her anymore.
34. Proud Boys (let their pride buoy their immune systems).
35. Whoever made Zoom.
36. Anti-maskers.
37. Murderers.


newyorker--2020-12-12--Notable Performances and Recordings of 2020

At the close of a catastrophic year in the performing arts , the annual ritual of cobbling together a list of highlights takes on a woeful cast .
To begin with , I saw only three in-person events after mid-March .
Although I watched dozens of performances online , sitting at my desk day after day lent the experiences a sense of sameness , of solipsism .
The power of joining an audience resides in yoking your individuality to a collective , however temporary or disparate .
In our electronic watchtowers , we seem to command a wide landscape , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the self .
The COVID-19 year has trapped us all the more completely in the digital bubbles from which we so often long to break out .
In a related development , the tech monopolies that already control too much of the cultural landscape have tightened their grip .
The damage that performing-arts groups and working performers have suffered is more severe than we can measure , and years will pass before even a partial recovery takes hold .
Union rights were already under sustained attack , and organizations may opportunistically use @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The Metropolitan Opera , which furloughed around a thousand employees in the spring , has offered to resume sending paychecks to unionized employees but only if they accept long-term reductions in salary .
Elsewhere , institutions have managed to avoid gutting their employees ’ livelihoods .
The case of the Columbus Symphony is worthy of note : remarkably , it has made no cuts for any of its full-time musicians or staff .
Admittedly , that orchestra is a far smaller organization than the Met .
As I commented in a piece @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dinosaurs of the musical world may face the gravest danger .
Listeners can play a role in the recovery , as well .
For more than twenty years , since Napster gave people the idea that music should be free for the taking , a radical devaluation of musicians ’ work has been under way .
Spotify and other streaming services have perpetuated and normalized that iniquity : the royalties they offer to non-superstar musicians are insultingly small .
It was all the more welcome , then , when , beginning in mid-March @ @ @ @ @ @ @ running a series of altruistic sales , the proceeds of which went directly to artists .
It ’ s also worth bearing in mind that streaming music is more destructive to the environment than any technology of musical reproduction that has come before .
I feel compelled to erect a memorial for eagerly anticipated performances that never took place .
Phantom highlights that come to mind : Alban Berg ’ s “ Lulu ” at the Cleveland Orchestra ; a new production of the “ Ring ” at Bayreuth ; the world première @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Innocence , ” in Aix-en-Provence ; a revival of Peter Sellars ’ s staging of “ Tristan und Isolde ” at the Los Angeles Philharmonic ; Barrie Kosky ’ s production of Prokofiev ’ s “ The Fiery Angel ” at the Met ; and Esa-Pekka Salonen ’ s inaugural concerts at the San Francisco Symphony .
John Keats notwithstanding , heard melodies are sweeter than the other kind .
Monday Evening Concerts , the venerable Los Angeles new-music series , has experienced a spectacular creative surge under the direction of the percussionist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ planned to write about the organization last spring , on the occasion of a series of programs with the immensely gifted baritone Davóne Tines .
M.E.C.
’ s January concert , with Hepfer ’ s Echoi ensemble , would have been occasion enough : Trevor Bača ’ s new piece “ ( H A R M O N Y ) , ” based on an austerely beautiful , Beckett-like text by Paul Griffiths , created a liminal world at once gorgeous and ominous , with an A-major chord shimmering like a mirage of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ faded out , the narrator , Paul Holdengräber , softly intoned , “ Not yet.
” The Irish composer and vocalist Jennifer Walshe , one of the most volcanically inventive forces in twenty-first-century arts , came to Brooklyn at the beginning of March to perform her voice-and-string-quartet work “ EVERYTHING IS IMPORTANT ” —an audiovisual pandemonium that gets close to the heart of the contemporary condition .
At the beginning of the fall , I made a virtual trip to the National Concert Hall , in Dublin , to hear and see “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ alternately hilarious and haunting meditation on Irish reality and myth .
Productions by the Los Angeles-based opera visionary Yuval Sharon have appeared on my end-of-year lists in five out of the past six years , and with good reason : no one in the field has been as consistently creative or daring .
The first of two astounding Sharon projects in 2020 was “ Sweet Land , ” an outdoor opera that meditated on the plundering of Native American lands by colonizers .
The score was a joint effort by the composers Du @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the other of Navajo descent .
Scenes from the work lingered in my mind as two ineradicable national crimes unfolded : the separation of children from their parents at the American border and the destruction of sacred Native sites by border-wall construction .
Igor Levit ’ s House Concerts in Berlin , March 12th to May 4th In the summer of 2019 , I began work on a Profile of the brilliant German pianist Igor Levit , whose political outspokenness has given him a prominence far outside the classical field .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Levit perform Busoni ’ s titanic Piano Concerto , which was to have been the culmination of the piece , but a different ending materialized : beginning in mid-March , Levit gave a series of nightly Hauskonzerte , or house concerts , in his apartment , in Berlin .
In the fall , he released a glowingly sombre album titled “ Encounter , ” pairing arrangements of Bach and Brahms with Morton Feldman ’ s “ Palais de mari , ” which had figured in one of his more memorable home broadcasts .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the presence and atmosphere of a live event .
But there was something exceptional about the Oslo Philharmonic ’ s rendition of Wagner ’ s “ Siegfried Idyll , ” which I singled out in a May column on Zoom-era music : the mixture of beauty and melancholy , longing and loss , brought me to the brink of tears .
My mother had died a few months earlier , and although she never cared for Wagner I thought of her all the same .
In the wake of nationwide protests following the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ J ’ Nai Bridges organized an online discussion with five fellow African-American singers : Julia Bullock , Lawrence Brownlee , Russell Thomas , Karen Slack , and Morris Robinson .
Their candor rocked the complacent world of American opera , encouraging an outwardly liberal establishment to see how systemic racism cuts through the heart of their institutions .
My first experience of live music during the pandemic took place in an unpromising locale : the Del Mar Fairgrounds , north of San Diego .
The Mainly Mozart series organized a performance of Mozart @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 136 ) and Mendelssohn ’ s Octet , involving musicians from the L.A. Phil and the San Diego Symphony .
Audience members sat in cars and honked their applause .
The event was a scrappily joyous affair , showing that the classics can make an impact outside formal settings .

At the close of a catastrophic year in the performing arts, the annual ritual of cobbling together a list of highlights takes on a woeful cast. To begin with, I saw only three in-person events after mid-March. Although I watched dozens of performances online, sitting at my desk day after day lent the experiences a sense of sameness, of solipsism. The power of joining an audience resides in yoking your individuality to a collective, however temporary or disparate. In our electronic watchtowers, we seem to command a wide landscape, but ultimately we rarely leave the cocoon of the self. The COVID-19 year has trapped us all the more completely in the digital bubbles from which we so often long to break out. In a related development, the tech monopolies that already control too much of the cultural landscape have tightened their grip.
2020 in Review New Yorker writers reflect on the year’s highs and lows.
The damage that performing-arts groups and working performers have suffered is more severe than we can measure, and years will pass before even a partial recovery takes hold. Union rights were already under sustained attack, and organizations may opportunistically use the crisis to degrade those rights further. The Metropolitan Opera, which furloughed around a thousand employees in the spring, has offered to resume sending paychecks to unionized employees but only if they accept long-term reductions in salary. Elsewhere, institutions have managed to avoid gutting their employees’ livelihoods. The case of the Columbus Symphony is worthy of note: remarkably, it has made no cuts for any of its full-time musicians or staff. Admittedly, that orchestra is a far smaller organization than the Met. As I commented in a piece on pandemic-era string-quartet activity, the hulking dinosaurs of the musical world may face the gravest danger.
Listeners can play a role in the recovery, as well. For more than twenty years, since Napster gave people the idea that music should be free for the taking, a radical devaluation of musicians’ work has been under way. Spotify and other streaming services have perpetuated and normalized that iniquity: the royalties they offer to non-superstar musicians are insultingly small. It was all the more welcome, then, when, beginning in mid-March, the enlightened music site Bandcamp began running a series of altruistic sales, the proceeds of which went directly to artists. It’s also worth bearing in mind that streaming music is more destructive to the environment than any technology of musical reproduction that has come before.
I feel compelled to erect a memorial for eagerly anticipated performances that never took place. Phantom highlights that come to mind: Alban Berg’s “Lulu” at the Cleveland Orchestra; a new production of the “Ring” at Bayreuth; the world première of Kaija Saariaho’s opera “Innocence,” in Aix-en-Provence; a revival of Peter Sellars’s staging of “Tristan und Isolde” at the Los Angeles Philharmonic; Barrie Kosky’s production of Prokofiev’s “The Fiery Angel” at the Met; and Esa-Pekka Salonen’s inaugural concerts at the San Francisco Symphony. John Keats notwithstanding, heard melodies are sweeter than the other kind.
Ten Notable Performances of 2020
Trevor Bača at Monday Evening Concerts, January 13th
Monday Evening Concerts, the venerable Los Angeles new-music series, has experienced a spectacular creative surge under the direction of the percussionist and conductor Jonathan Hepfer. I had planned to write about the organization last spring, on the occasion of a series of programs with the immensely gifted baritone Davóne Tines. M.E.C.’s January concert, with Hepfer’s Echoi ensemble, would have been occasion enough: Trevor Bača’s new piece “( H A R M O N Y ),” based on an austerely beautiful, Beckett-like text by Paul Griffiths, created a liminal world at once gorgeous and ominous, with an A-major chord shimmering like a mirage of hope at the end. When it faded out, the narrator, Paul Holdengräber, softly intoned, “Not yet.”
Jennifer Walshe at National Sawdust, March 1st
Illustration by Anja Slibar
The Irish composer and vocalist Jennifer Walshe, one of the most volcanically inventive forces in twenty-first-century arts, came to Brooklyn at the beginning of March to perform her voice-and-string-quartet work “EVERYTHING IS IMPORTANT”—an audiovisual pandemonium that gets close to the heart of the contemporary condition. At the beginning of the fall, I made a virtual trip to the National Concert Hall, in Dublin, to hear and see “Ireland: A Dataset,” an alternately hilarious and haunting meditation on Irish reality and myth.
“Sweet Land” in Los Angeles, March 7th
Productions by the Los Angeles-based opera visionary Yuval Sharon have appeared on my end-of-year lists in five out of the past six years, and with good reason: no one in the field has been as consistently creative or daring. The first of two astounding Sharon projects in 2020 was “Sweet Land,” an outdoor opera that meditated on the plundering of Native American lands by colonizers. The score was a joint effort by the composers Du Yun and Raven Chacon—the first is Chinese-American, the other of Navajo descent. Scenes from the work lingered in my mind as two ineradicable national crimes unfolded: the separation of children from their parents at the American border and the destruction of sacred Native sites by border-wall construction.
Igor Levit’s House Concerts in Berlin, March 12th to May 4th
Illustration by Andrea Ventura
In the summer of 2019, I began work on a Profile of the brilliant German pianist Igor Levit, whose political outspokenness has given him a prominence far outside the classical field. The shutdown prevented me from travelling to see Levit perform Busoni’s titanic Piano Concerto, which was to have been the culmination of the piece, but a different ending materialized: beginning in mid-March, Levit gave a series of nightly Hauskonzerte, or house concerts, in his apartment, in Berlin. In the fall, he released a glowingly sombre album titled “Encounter,” pairing arrangements of Bach and Brahms with Morton Feldman’s “Palais de mari,” which had figured in one of his more memorable home broadcasts.
Oslo Philharmonic, May 7th


My Life in Cars

Campbell Ewald was too big , its layers of command too complex , to allow an intimate atmosphere .
We creative drones seldom even saw our ostensible partners , the account executives .
Print copywriters and art directors , the creative infantry , worked in cubicles no bigger than they had to be to hold a man and his typewriter .
I wish I ’ d pilfered the big old Underwood that came as standard equipment .
You could drop one of those behemoths from the tenth floor , and it might bounce but it wouldn ’ t break .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ profundity .
The dark wood , frosted glass , and a stiff sense of order in the office lent an aura of solidity and a kind of charm reminiscent of a bank .
It certainly didn ’ t feel like the world “ Mad Men ” would later depict .
Not that there wasn ’ t drinking .
A few weeks in , a grizzled , middle-aged fellow-copywriter named Bart took me to lunch .
His enthusiasm , if he ever had any , was buried under a thick layer of cynicism .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Work didn ’ t interest him .
He introduced me to the two-hour , three-martini lunch .
It wasn ’ t Bart ’ s invention , but nobody ever did more to honor it .
Bart , with his toilet humor and alcoholic passion , eventually wore me down .
The time passed among red-leather banquettes and linen tablecloths first appeared to be glamorous , then revealed itself as pathetic .
It turns my ears pink today to recall the Corvette headlines I perpetrated .
The 1963 Corvette Sting Ray , a startlingly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of making people want to buy it , was the most technically advanced and arguably the least criticized car in General Motors history .
And yet “ Clip Along the Dotted Line ” was the headline I wrote for one Corvette ad .
A lame pun : the photo above it showed a Corvette clipping along the dotted center line on a rural highway .
Another inanity of stupendous irrelevance : “ We Took a Little off the Top.
” I borrowed a barbering phrase to prattle about the way the doors of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the roof .
Not that Chevrolet advertising set a standard for innovation anywhere .
Corporate advertising clung to “ Jet-Smooth Ride ” as the slogan for the entire model line for years .
This gem had come from the pen of Campbell Ewald ’ s chairman , a Buddha-size man of a certain age whose name , ironically , was Mr. Little .
Someone at Chevrolet decided that the failing Corvair could be repositioned as an ideal runabout for women : rear-engined and thus light-steering , gutless enough not to frighten a spinster @ @ @ @ @ @ @ colors .
Into the breach lunged Mr. Little , an unchallenged copywriting tyro such as only an agency chairman could be .
His Corvair headline : “ She flirts with you , that ’ s what she does !
” The creative troops cringed .
After two and a half years , my euphoria at having been given a professional home and the early makings of an advertising career had tapered off .
I had learned just enough to start feeling restless .
A few of my copywriting friends had defected to New @ @ @ @ @ @ @ agency in the world .
D.D.B.
’ s Volkswagen work alone ( the now famous “ Think Small ” ad ) heralded a brash new dogma that suddenly made big , conventional agencies seem constipated .
D.D.B .
mocked the mastodons ’ research departments , mission statements , focus groups , and “ safe ” advertising .
Instead , there arose a blasphemous sidestepping of social science , a practice of going straight for the jugular .
I felt ready to test my brains and talents in the big leagues , in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

Campbell Ewald was too big, its layers of command too complex, to allow an intimate atmosphere. We creative drones seldom even saw our ostensible partners, the account executives. Print copywriters and art directors, the creative infantry, worked in cubicles no bigger than they had to be to hold a man and his typewriter. I wish I’d pilfered the big old Underwood that came as standard equipment. You could drop one of those behemoths from the tenth floor, and it might bounce but it wouldn’t break. And its elegant typeface transformed banalities into profundity. The dark wood, frosted glass, and a stiff sense of order in the office lent an aura of solidity and a kind of charm reminiscent of a bank. It certainly didn’t feel like the world “Mad Men” would later depict.
Not that there wasn’t drinking. A few weeks in, a grizzled, middle-aged fellow-copywriter named Bart took me to lunch. His enthusiasm, if he ever had any, was buried under a thick layer of cynicism. Drinking was Bart’s hobby. Work didn’t interest him. He introduced me to the two-hour, three-martini lunch. It wasn’t Bart’s invention, but nobody ever did more to honor it. Bart, with his toilet humor and alcoholic passion, eventually wore me down. The time passed among red-leather banquettes and linen tablecloths first appeared to be glamorous, then revealed itself as pathetic.
It turns my ears pink today to recall the Corvette headlines I perpetrated. The 1963 Corvette Sting Ray, a startlingly original design, capable on looks alone of making people want to buy it, was the most technically advanced and arguably the least criticized car in General Motors history. And yet “Clip Along the Dotted Line” was the headline I wrote for one Corvette ad. A lame pun: the photo above it showed a Corvette clipping along the dotted center line on a rural highway. Another inanity of stupendous irrelevance: “We Took a Little off the Top.” I borrowed a barbering phrase to prattle about the way the doors of this hot new sports car cut into the roof. Not that Chevrolet advertising set a standard for innovation anywhere. Corporate advertising clung to “Jet-Smooth Ride” as the slogan for the entire model line for years. This gem had come from the pen of Campbell Ewald’s chairman, a Buddha-size man of a certain age whose name, ironically, was Mr. Little. Someone at Chevrolet decided that the failing Corvair could be repositioned as an ideal runabout for women: rear-engined and thus light-steering, gutless enough not to frighten a spinster, cute as a button in pastel colors. Into the breach lunged Mr. Little, an unchallenged copywriting tyro such as only an agency chairman could be. His Corvair headline: “She flirts with you, that’s what she does!” The creative troops cringed.
After two and a half years, my euphoria at having been given a professional home and the early makings of an advertising career had tapered off. I had learned just enough to start feeling restless. A few of my copywriting friends had defected to New York—to Doyle Dane Bernbach, the hottest agency in the world. D.D.B.’s Volkswagen work alone (the now famous “Think Small” ad) heralded a brash new dogma that suddenly made big, conventional agencies seem constipated. D.D.B. mocked the mastodons’ research departments, mission statements, focus groups, and “safe” advertising. Instead, there arose a blasphemous sidestepping of social science, a practice of going straight for the jugular. I felt ready to test my brains and talents in the big leagues, in the most competitive arena extant, New York.