DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

The author sheltering-in-place in an island paradise. Photo by David Collins BY DILLON ALEXANDER When I got a job teaching high school social studies in Hawaii, people tried to scare me with stories of island fever. Having lived here, on the most remote island chain in the world, for almost two years, I had a few pangs, but nothing to write home about. Now take that island fever, and add a pandemic and consequent mandatory-shelter-in-place order, and what do you have? Island Fever + Cabin Fever = Total Insanity? No, not for me. But I’m lucky and I know it. […]

WORTH REPEATING: This Is How Rome Fell

THE ATLANTIC: When the virus came here, it found a country with serious underlying conditions, and it exploited them ruthlessly. Chronic ills—a corrupt political class, a sclerotic bureaucracy, a heartless economy, a divided and distracted public—had gone untreated for years. We had learned to live, uncomfortably, with the symptoms. It took the scale and intimacy of a pandemic to expose their severity—to shock Americans with the recognition that we are in the high-risk category. The crisis demanded a response that was swift, rational, and collective. The United States reacted instead like Pakistan or Belarus—like a country with shoddy infrastructure and […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

EDITOR’S NOTE: We’ve asked Phawker contributors to send in dispatches describing their lives under quarantine. Enjoy. BY DYLAN LONG I got let off of work in the middle of my shift. We turned the lights off and began disinfecting the store for a final time. Card readers, chairs, counters, clothing racks, the works. Rumors floated about that the whole city was shutting down. It was mid-March. Our store’s shutting down felt overdue, but thankfully, the company I work for was giving us two weeks paid leave. I left work and walked straight down to the Wine & Spirits store, which […]

Bob Dylan Press Conference San Francisco 1965

ROLLING STONE: When Bob Dylan‘s five concerts in the San Francisco Bay Area were scheduled in December 1965, the idea was proposed that he hold a press conference in the studios of KQED, the educational television station. Dylan accepted and flew out a day early to make it. He arrived early for the press conference accompanied by Robbie Robertson and several other members of his band, drank tea in the KQED office and insisted that he was ready to talk about “anything you want to talk about.” His only request was that he be able to leave at 3 p.m. […]

DISPATCHES: My Life Under Quarantine

Photo by JOHN WEINSTEIN BY KYLE WEINSTEIN I was student teaching 10th graders at a charter school in Philly when they closed the schools. Up until then, I was drowning in sub-par essays with thesis statements like “Through the use of symbolism in which represents love illustrates that love could be real but also hurtful,” and supporting topic sentences like “First, Shakespeare is fake.” My temples have been rubbed raw and my brow muscles are Hulked-up from excessive furrowing. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the teaching has its rewards, like when a kid visited me after the final bell rang […]

KENNETH COPELAND: Wind Of God

WIKIPEDIA: Kenneth Max Copeland (born December 6, 1936) is an American televangelist, and author associated with the Charismatic Movement. He runs the Kenneth Copeland Ministries based in Tarrant County, Texas. He has been identified as preaching the prosperity gospel. As part of his evangelism, he calls for donations to his church, with the suggestion that parishioners will get a “hundredfold” return on their investment.[2] He has stirred controversy over his use of donations to finance mansions, private jets, an airport and other lavish purchases.[3][4] During the pandemic of COVID-19 in 2020, Copeland gained national attention for his comments and actions […]

NEIL NATHAN: Some Humans Ain’t Human

RIP John Prine – Some Humans Ain’t Human by Neil Nathan “I feel blessed to have seen John Prine on his last tour for The Tree of Forgiveness record. It was a joy to witness him dancing around, happy as a clam, doing what he loved. Some Humans Ain’t Human encapsulates a lot of what I love about John Prine songs, hard truths spoken plainly, laced with that uniquely dark sense of humor, which makes you want to laugh and cry at the same time. He also has a gift for making the personal political and vice versa. In the […]

RIP: Eric Taylor, A Folksinger’s Folksinger

BY JONATHAN HOULON FOLK MUSIC EDITOR In the midst of all of “this,” it would be a shame for the recent death of one of America’s best songwriters to come out of Texas or really anywhere to go unnoticed. And other than a wonderful obit in the NYT by Bill Friskics-Warren, it appears to have. I first caught up with Eric Taylor in a Quaker meeting house in Phoenixville, PA. I’d been hearing about him for years: Vietnam vet, ex-junkie, second wife was Nanci Griffith, came out of the same Houston folk scene of the late 60s/early 70s that produced […]

HOT DOCUMENTS: The Red Dawn Emails

NEW YORK TIMES: As the coronavirus emerged and headed toward the United States, an extraordinary conversation was hatched among an elite group of infectious disease doctors and medical experts in the federal government and academic institutions around the nation. Red Dawn — a nod to the 1984 film with Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen — was the nickname for the email chain they built. Different threads in the chain were named Red Dawn Breaking, Red Dawn Rising, Red Dawn Breaking Bad and, as the situation grew more dire, Red Dawn Raging. It was hosted by the chief medical officer at […]

MUST SEE TV: The Tiger King Is NOT A Role Model

BY RACHEL TESON On the off chance you haven’t heard by now, Netflix’s six-hour breakout docu-series Tiger King is a jaw-dropping white-trash shit-show that somehow combines tigers, gay rednecks, the FBI, a sex cult, a fried blonde mullet from hell, a wealthy definitely-missing and quite-possibly murdered husband, an on-camera suicide, a ridiculous run for the presidency, and it all ends, fittingly, in a 22 year murder-for-hire prison sentence. In other words, it’s must-see TV. The co-directors Eric Goode and Rebecca Chaiklin played both sides of the story, allowing the viewers to get a full view of all the crazy horrendous […]

GOD SAVE JOHN PRINE: Please Lord, We Don’t Ask For Much (In Fact We’ve Never Asked For Anything)

EDITOR’S NOTE: John Prine passed away today of complications from Covid19. So we’re re-posting Jonathan Houlon’s tribute penned a week ago upon the news that Prine had contracted Covid19 and was in the ICU on a ventilator. Jesus Christ died for nothing, I suppose. Goddamn. BY JONATHAN HOULON If you haven’t heard, sad news from Nashville: John Prine, folksinger-songwriter extraordinaire and a goddamn national treasure, is on a ventilator with Covid-19 symptoms. If anyone can beat this thing, it’s Prine — he’s proven to be pretty much un-killable. He’s already stood up to cancer. Twice! One of his bouts and […]