| Hello! Welcome to the next edition of Insider Today. Please sign up here. As a reminder, this is an email publication that David Plotz and I are writing with the help of many of our excellent journalists. Our goal is to provide you with insight and analysis about the big stories of the day. Thanks as always for reading. Please feel free to reply to this email and tell us what you like or don't like, and we'll evolve and improve as we go. —Henry Blodget (henry@insider.com) and David Plotz (david@insider.com) SUMMARY: One thing that makes the lockdowns difficult is that most Americans don't feel like we're doing anything to help. A horrifying statistic that shows how many restaurant workers have been whacked by this crisis—and how little the government has done to help. A former prosecutor, a Democrat, is skeptical of the sexual assault claim against Biden. Should cities just ban cars on some streets forever? And, your mail! Do you feel useless? You're not alone.
One of the hardest things about the pandemic is that it's difficult for most of us to be useful. Some people are finding spectacular ways to help — doctors and farmers and nursing home attendants, and also garage entrepreneurs 3-D printing masks. But for most us, the primary obligation during this period has been stasis. We've been told that the best way to help is to do nothing. There's a wonderful new Caitlin Flanagan essay in the Atlantic about how her father lost his college years when World War II broke out. He joined the Navy. The world turned upside down, and there was something he — and virtually all of his peers — were able to do to help. After 9/11, President Bush exhorted Americans to shop and "get down to Disney World." Bush was widely mocked for this — I probably mocked him myself. But he was on to something. The best way for Americans to reduce the fear that terrorists seek to spread — the best way to be useful — was to quickly return to normal life — to shop and go to Disney World. This is an important lesson to remember as the Reopen debate becomes more heated. I suspect what many people are thinking about when they talk about reopening is not the raging 100-keg party they want to have. They want to find a way to contribute that isn't just huddling at home. Huddling at home feels cowardly, hidden, and impotent. Humans are allergic to inaction, and long to be useful. That's why so many thousands of people have signed up to be directly infected by the coronavirus as part of a vaccine trial, why so many volunteer opportunities are oversubscribed. We'd be in better shape as a nation — and the reopen debate would be less poisonous — if our leaders could find more ways to make more of us feel useful, or even be useful. Sitting on the couch doesn't feel like enough. —DP Two shocking numbers about the restaurant catastrophe The food-service industry accounted for 60% of March job losses, but according to Insider's Sara Silverstein's interview with chef and food TV host Andrew Zimmern the industry received only 9% of the funds from the Paycheck Protection Program, the small business lending program set up by Congress. — DP A former prosecutor says he's skeptical about the sexual assault allegation against former Vice President Biden, but his own political preferences are clear
Amid growing calls for Biden himself to address the sexual assault allegation recently made against him — his campaign has said it didn't happen, but he himself hasn't answered in-depth questions — a former federal prosecutor explains in USA Today why he's skeptical about the claim. The former prosecutor, Michael Stern, says his default view is to believe women who come forward with assault allegations. But he says that very occasionally — twice in a 30-year career — he dismissed cases because he became convinced that the stories he was being told weren't true. Stern doesn't mention his personal political preferences in the op-ed, but his Twitter bio make them clear: "#Resisting all things Trump," the bio reads. "#BlueNoMatterWho." During the sexual-assault hearing for Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Stern wrote op-eds that take the other side of at least one of the points he makes while assessing the credibility of Biden's accuser, former staffer Tara Reade. In his USA Today op-ed, Stern cites 9 reasons for skepticism of Reade, among them her 27-year reporting delay and the lack of a record of a formal complaint that Reade says she filed. On the first point, Stern explained in a column during the Kavanaugh hearings the many reasons why some women do wait years and decades to come forward, or never to speak out at all. Tara Reade's allegation against Biden is critically important. It could impact the election, and, with it, the future of the world. So as Biden himself has suggested, the facts and interpretations should be scrutinized. Some readers of Stern's column will note his political preferences and discount everything he says. Others will judge the points he makes independently of his motivations for making them. No one will ever know for certain what happened in that hallway back in 1993, or even if anything happened at all. Instead, as additional information and interpretations emerge, we will develop our own views of the allegation,the participants, and those who comment on the allegations just as we have with the many sexual assault and harassment allegations made against President Trump. — HB A new twist in the story about the couple who drank fish-tank cleaner after President Trump touted a similar-sounding coronavirus wonder drug As you may remember, shortly after the President began extolling the benefits of an old malaria drug called hydroxychloroquine for use against the coronavirus, a woman in Arizona reported that her husband had died after she suggested that they take some of a similar-sounding chemical, which was in fact fish-tank cleaner. The distraught woman, who had also ended up in the hospital, blamed the President and said she didn't know why anyone would ever listen to him. This story was cited by some as an inevitable consequence of Trump's reckless promotion of unproven quack remedies in press conferences. It was cited by others as evidence of nothing more than human stupidity. But it turns out the moral of the story may be something else altogether. The Washington Free Beacon reports that the homicide division of the Mesa City, Arizona police department are now conducting an investigation into the husband's death and requested a recording to the wife's interview with the outlet. Rather than having been nudged into tragedy by the President's ramblings, it seems, there may have been something else going on. — HB Should cities take advantage of the pandemic to close streets to cars? Cities have closed or are planning to close more than 1,000 miles of streets to cars because of COVID-19. 1,000 miles! The street closures, which include everything from hundreds of miles of pop-up bike lanes in Paris to 11 miles of car-free parkways in Louisville, certainly make sense as a temporary measure. The pandemic has slashed urban commuting, and social distancing means all of us need more space when we go outside. This is policy by tragedy, so bike and pedestrian activists are careful not to be gleeful, but they're also using the #Covid19streets hashtag to make the case for making changes permanent. Obviously some roads must reopen when commuters and shoppers return. But it's also likely that cities may rebound faster with better infrastructure for walkers and cyclists. As anyone who's lived through a neighborhood bike lane debate knows, city dwellers grumble before streets go car free or parking spaces disappear, but they almost always end up cherishing the space to bike and walk. — DP And now... your thoughts! On "Why didn't Pence wear a mask?" First, the results of our poll! About a third of you think the reason Pence didn't wear a mask at the Mayo Clinic is that "he wants Trump to keep him on the ticket." Another third of you believe he had multiple reasons for doing so:
And now, some of your letters:
Pence didn't wear a mask because he's brave, and bravery is inspiring As a registered independent voting older American I'd like to present you with a different angle, one that many more centrist older Americans may find more acceptable. Pence didn't wear a mask to show that we can't live in fear forever and that wearing a mask for the rest of our lives is not a cure-all either. You're too young to remember the Communist witch hunt and how that snowballed into a serious issue in the US and the subsequent hiding in bunkers and under our school desks because you never knew when a nuclear bomb was coming. But somebody at some point finally said enough is enough and figured out that yes, there is a threat but no, we can not allow this to all consume our lives. Bravo to Pence for showing courage as is his right to do. It's not a law to wear a mask (not yet, anyway), and somebody has to step up and show that you can resume your life without fear. Lastly, if Pence is the only person in the room not wearing the protective security of a face mask wouldn't he be less likely to contract the virus or give it to someone else? — from reader B.C. Pence is Trump's lapdog Pence is Trump's lapdog, reading from a script whenever he's on TV, kowtowing to his boss. He and Trump are an embarrassment to our country. Pence's stunt at the Mayo clinic is reprehensible, at best. The Mayo Clinic should have refused to let him in the hospital. While the Mayo Clinic is renowned worldwide as a leader in the medical field, Pence is a politician. Pence would have looked like an idiot, and the Mayo Clinic would have further enhanced it's reputation as a top-notch quality medical institution that stands by its principles. — from reader G.C. On "Blaming the victims of COVID-19": The point is that people are dying because they're listening to Trump I have not read the New York Times article you refer to, but I have read the Washington Post article. Although you state that the Post paints a subtle, sympathetic portrait…," you go on to say that "I don't get the point of these stories, which reduce rich, complicated lives to an ironic punchline." I think that is an unfair characterization of the Post article. The article did not mock his beliefs, but I think pointed out how people like him have been and may continue to be harmed by their faith in a president who spews out medical nonsense and is failing to lead. Trump's failure of leadership is harming all Americans, both in terms of medical advice and economically, especially those who support him. Just look at the jump in poison control calls following the president's bleach comment. That is what comes through to me from the Post article, not a punchline. — from reader B.M. Thank you for reading! Please let us know what you think. It's great to hear from you, and we may publish your note! henry@insider.com and david@insider.com | 