Adam Schlesinger

Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne died from the coronavirus yesterday. He was 52. Check out “Red Dragon Tattoo”, “Stacy’s Mom”, and “Mexican Wine” from links in the article you can access from the first tweet below. Fountains of Wayne were a power pop band with a great sense of humor and compassions for the people who populated their songs. They performed on a Kinks tribute album and they have some of the same attributes as them.

The last link in the Rob Tannenbaum tweet is to Robbie Fulks’s hilarious “Fountains of Wayne Hotline””.

Denmark’s path to economic rescue

This is an excellent article. In Denmark, the wealthy pay more taxes than they do here. This will aid their recovery from the coronavirus.

Baltimore may be benefitting from empty houses

The peak population of Baltimore was about 950,000. Now, it is estimated to be below 600,000.

In most ways, this is very bad for the city. Lost population means fewer jobs and less tax revenue, for example. It means thousands of abandoned houses that may never be filled.

This may actually be a good thing during the coronavirus pandemic. So far, Baltimore has not had the high volume of cases some other cities have had. Baltimore is like a 150 pound person wearing a 2XL shirt. The reduced population density resulting from lower population may be resulting in social distancing.

Update 4/21 – tweets on the murder rate

Trump rolls back Obama standards which affect the climate

Terrible. The Trump cult doesn’t believe in science or facts.

Kurosawa films on TCM on 4/1

TCM is running a series of films directed by Akira Kurosawa tomorrow starting with Drunken Angel. The star, Toshiro Mifune, would have been 100 years old this year. I recommend all of them but my favorites are:

Yojimbo and its sequel Sanjuro

High and Low

Trump lies about coronavirus tests

Trump claims nobody is saying there aren’t enough tests. Just another lie.

He blames it on Obama when the virus didn’t exist during the Obama years. Liar!