Tag: Ed Weathers

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

The Great Divide

I was driving back roads north of Memphis last Saturday, up around Shelby Forest, which, it turned out, was closed due to the COVID-19 situation. The locals, however, didn’t seem to be much worried about it.

At a country gas station/convenience store where I stopped, it could have been April 2019. There was no difference in behavior among the patrons, no evidence whatsoever that the disease that is consuming most of the country’s attention even existed. Six bikers sat at a picnic table eating sandwiches and chips. People stood in line inside, and came and went from the pumps to the store with casual indifference to the six-feet-apart warning. A couple of them looked sideways at the weirdo wearing a mask and wiping down the handle at the gas pump. I smiled at them, but they couldn’t see it.

Maybe they’re onto something. Maybe the sneaky virus doesn’t pose as much of a danger to country folks who already live separated from their neighbors, who gather only at convenience stores on a pleasant Saturday afternoon. It seemed to be a bet most of them were making.

It’s a point of view echoed by Rush Limbaugh and numerous other, er, conservatives, who contend that the economy is being closed down to ruin Donald Trump’s chances of re-election. They say that the disease threat is being exaggerated and that the “leftists” are all in on it, especially the media. According to Rush and the president’s other cheerleaders, those of us in the media are apparently so intent on bringing down the president, we’re willing to destroy our own businesses — and the businesses of all our advertisers — to spite the president. Logic!

Logical or not, it’s a sentiment that’s gaining momentum in the White House, as the president looks to “reopen the country” as soon as possible. Since the president didn’t “shut down” the country — governors and other local officials did — there is some confusion as to how exactly he’d open it up.

Trump said Monday at his daily briefing that, as president, his “authority is total.” When it was pointed out by a reporter that it’s actually the governors who have the power to decide when to open up their states, Trump fumed and turned red and insulted the reporter. The next day, he tweeted something about “Mutiny on the Bounty” and suggested the “Democratic governors” were mutineers who should remember they “need so much from the Captain.” Meaning, I suppose, that Trump will continue using federal aid for the fight against coronavirus as a political weapon, just as he has been for weeks. People are dying because the president doesn’t like the level of “respect” he gets from certain governors. History will not be kind to Captain Trump.

So, what happens when Trump gets antsy and decides to unilaterally declare the country “open for business” on, say May 15th? If past is prologue, most GOP governors will supinely follow the president’s lead and declare that their states — Mississippi, Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, to name a few — are magically out of danger and ready to roll. Everything’s back to normal!

Governors who think science and medical expertise are more important markers for public safety than ideology or obeisance to the president will likely move more cautiously, hoping to avoid a resurgence of the disease in their state.

This will “open up America” in an entirely new way. A great Darwinian experiment will ensue, as Americans divide into two camps: those who believe in the president and who will gleefully return to normal activities, and those who think he’s a fool and who will keep wearing masks and distancing until scientists and medical experts say to do otherwise. Masks will become the progressive version of the MAGA hat, the mark of a socialist wussy who doesn’t believe in Trump.

My clever friend (and former Memphis magazine editor) Ed Weathers proposed this week that when Trump reopens the economy, he should hold large rallies in swing states and shake lots of hands, just to prove how right he is. For the record, I think this is a brilliant plan and I hope someone suggests it to The Donald.

So which side will turn out to be right? It should be easy to keep score. If Trump is correct and the disease just “goes away,” the maskers will look like sissies. If, on the other hand, the scientists of the world are correct, those of us who believed them will have the last laugh.

Literally.

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

Battling Big Pharma: 10 Ways to Lower American Drug Costs

CREDIT: Greg Cravens

Fifty-five percent of Americans take at least one prescription medication.

Americans spend more than $325 billion per year on prescription drugs. We pay, by far, the highest prices for necessary prescription drugs in the world. We spend 50 percent more per capita on drugs than, say, Canada and Germany, and two to six times as much for specialty pharmaceuticals such as cancer and diabetes drugs.

The pharmaceutical industry wants to keep it that way. That’s why today it has 1,100 lobbyists in Washington, D.C. In the 2016 elections, it spent $58 million to support the campaigns of congressional and presidential candidates. This year, it will spend about $300 million on congressional lobbying. No wonder Congress is, shall we say, a bit shy about passing legislation that might lower the profits of U.S. drug companies.

Greg Cravens

But if Congress did want to lower drug prices, here are 10 things it could do. Some of these proposals are conservative (fewer drug regulations), some liberal (more government involvement in pricing). Nearly all are supported by a majority of voters in both parties:

1) Let Medicare negotiate drug prices. Nearly a third of all prescription-drug spending in the U.S. is done by Medicare, meaning it could have tremendous leverage to lower drug prices. Yet Medicare is, by law, forbidden from negotiating with pharmaceutical companies over the prices of the drugs it pays for. If Medicare negotiates, drug prices will drop.

2) Give generics a fighting chance. In theory, when the patent on a brand-name drug lapses, similarly effective, similarly designed generic drugs can enter the market to provide price competition. But FDA rules place huge obstacles in the way of creating generics; approval of a generic can take many years and cost millions of dollars. And Big Pharma often games the system: For example, a Big Pharma company can make a small, medically meaningless tweak in a patent-expired drug and then claim it is a “new” drug that is not duplicated by generics. Big brand-name companies are also known to pay smaller generic companies to keep their generics off the market, thereby avoiding generic competition.

3) Make drug companies justify their pricing. Require drug makers to be transparent about their manufacturing, research, development, advertising, and lobbying costs, and about how much profit is built into the price of each drug. Profiteering companies would be publicly shamed into moderating costs.

4) Allow drugs to be imported from Canada. Canadian drugs are just as safe as drugs made and sold in the U.S., and they are cheaper. But current Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rules, sometimes written by Big Pharma lobbyists, put big obstacles in the way of importing Canadian drugs.

5) Let more drugs be sold over the counter. In other countries, safe, well-researched drugs like statins and birth-control pills are sold over the counter, thereby eliminating the prescriber and pharmacy middlemen for many drugs.

6) Give automatic approval to drugs approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA). Like Canadian drugs, these are as safe as FDA-approved drugs. The EMA’s approval process is at least at tough as that of the FDA, and the drugs are far cheaper, in most cases, than their American equivalents.

7) End direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs. These are those TV ads you see during the nightly news. They often encourage the public to buy more expensive drugs than they need.

8) Set prices based on the effectiveness of drugs. Compel drug companies to reveal, more transparently than they do now, just how well their drugs work compared to their cheaper competitors.

9) Control the “orphan drug” designation more tightly. An orphan drug is a drug used by very few patients. To get a pharmaceutical company to make and sell the drug, the government gives it a monopoly on the drug, and then allows it to charge whatever it wants — sometimes thousands of times what the drug costs to make. Many Big Pharma companies have found ways — too complex to go into here — to earn the “orphan” designation by skirting regulations.

10) Stop issuing patent monopolies on essential drugs, and have the government determine those drug prices. This has worked in other developed countries, but it won’t soon happen here — too many Big Pharma lobbyists. No sense tilting at windmills, so better to focus on items 1 through 9.

Ed Weathers is a former editor of Memphis magazine, now retired from the faculty of Virginia Tech. He lives in Blacksburg, Virginia. Read about Ed’s personal battle with Big Pharma in the September 2017 issue of Memphis or at www.memphismagazine.com.

Categories
Film Features Film/TV

The Sweet Thereafter

In honor of the 25th anniversary of the Memphis Flyer (our first quarter quell, as it were), I have chosen my personal favorite film from each year since the Flyer began publication. Then, for each of those films, I unearthed and have excerpted some quotes from the review we ran at the time. — Greg Akers

1989: #1 Mystery Train, Jim Jarmusch (#2 Do the Right Thing, Spike Lee)

“While all the scenes in Mystery Train are identifiable by anyone living west of Goodlett, their geographical relationship gets altered to a point where we start to trust Jarmusch more than our own memories.” — Jim Newcomb, March 8, 1990

“Filmed primarily at the downtown corner of South Main and Calhoun, Jarmusch does not use the Peabody Hotel, the Mississippi River, Graceland, or most of the other locations that the Chamber of Commerce would thrust before any visiting filmmaker. His domain concerns exactly that territory which is not regularly tread by the masses, and his treatment of Memphis is likely to open a few eyes.”
— Robert Gordon, March 8, 1990

1990: #1 Goodfellas, Martin Scorsese (#2 Reversal of Fortune, Barbet Schroeder)

“This may not be De Niro’s best-ever performance, but he’s got that gangster thang down pat. His accent is flawless, his stature is perfect, and, boy, does he give Sansabelt slacks new meaning.”
— The Cinema Sisters, September 27, 1990

1991: #1 Terminator 2: Judgment Day, James Cameron (#2 The Silence of the Lambs, Jonathan Demme)

“Terminator 2 is an Alfa Romeo of a movie: pricey, sleek, fast, and loaded with horsepower. By comparison, the first Terminator was a Volkswagen. On the whole, I’d rather have a Volkswagen — they’re cheap and reliable. But, hey, Alfas can be fun too.” — Ed Weathers, July 11, 1993

1992: #1 Glengarry Glen Ross, James Foley (#2 The Last of the Mohicans, Michael Mann)

“Mamet’s brilliantly stylized look at the American Dream’s brutality as practiced by low-rent real estate salesmen who would put the screws to their mothers to keep their own tawdry jobs doesn’t relax its hard muscle for a moment. In the hands of this extraordinary cast, it is like a male chorus on amphetamines singing a desparate, feverish ode to capitalism and testosterone run amuck.”
— Hadley Hury, October 15, 1992

1993: #1 Dazed and Confused, Richard Linklater (#2 Jurassic Park, Steven Spielberg)

“Dazed and Confused is a brief trip down memory lane. The characters are not just protagonists and antagonists. They are clear representations of the folks we once knew, and their feelings are those we had years and years ago. Linklater doesn’t, however, urge us to get mushy. He is just asking us to remember.”
— Susan Ellis, November 4, 1993

1994: #1 Pulp Fiction, Quentin Tarantino (#2 Ed Wood, Tim Burton)

“Even though Tarantino is known for his bratty insistence on being shocking by way of gratuitous violence and ethnic slurs, it’s the little things that mean so much in a Tarantino film — camera play, dialogue, performances, and music.”
— Susan Ellis, October 20, 1994

1995: #1 Heat, Michael Mann
(#2 Toy Story, John Lasseter)

“I’m sick of lowlifes and I’m sick of being told to find them fascinating by writers and directors who get a perverse testosterone rush in exalting these lives to a larger-than-life heroism with slow-motion, lovingly lingered-over mayhem and death, expertly photographed and disturbingly dehumanizing.”
— Hadley Hury, December 21, 1995

1996: #1 Lone Star, John Sayles
(#2 Fargo, Joel and Ethan Coen)

“Although Lone Star takes place in a dusty Texas border town, it comes into view like a welcome oasis on the landscape of dog-day action films … Chris Cooper and Sayles’ sensitive framing of the performance produce an arresting character who inhabits a world somewhere between Dostoevsky and Larry McMurtry.”
— Hadley Hury, August 8, 1996

1997: #1 L.A. Confidential, Curtis Hanson (#2 The Apostle, Robert Duvall)

L.A. Confidential

“L.A. Confidential takes us with it on a descent, and not one frame of this remarkable film tips its hand as to whether we’ll go to hell or, if we do, whether we’ll come back. We end up on the edge of our seat, yearning for two protagonists, both anti-heroes … to gun their way to a compromised moral victory, to make us believe again in at least the possibility of trust.”

— Hadley Hury, October 2, 1997

1998: #1 Saving Private Ryan, Steven Spielberg (#2 The Big Lebowski, Joel and Ethan Coen)

“Spielberg is finishing the job he began with Schindler’s List. He’s already shown us why World War II was fought; now he shows us how. … Spielberg’s message is that war is horrifying yet sometimes necessary. And that may be true. But I still prefer the message gleaned from Peter Weir’s 1981 masterpiece, Gallipoli: War is stupid.” — Debbie Gilbert, July 30, 1998

1999: #1 Magnolia, Paul Thomas Anderson (#2 The End of the Affair, Neil Jordan)

“Magnolia is a film in motion; there’s a cyclical nature where paths are set that will be taken. It’s about fate, not will, where the bad will hurt and good will be redeemed.”
— Susan Ellis, January 13, 2000

2000: #1 Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Ang Lee (#2 You Can Count On Me, Kenneth Lonergan)

“Thrilling as art and entertainment, as simple movie pleasure, and as Oscar-baiting ‘prestige’ cinema. Early hype has the film being compared to Star Wars. … An even more apt comparison might be Singin’ in the Rain, a genre celebration that Crouching Tiger at least approaches in its lightness, joy, and the sheer kinetic wonder of its fight/dance set pieces.”
— Chris Herrington, February 1, 2001

A.I. Artificial Intelligence

2001: #1 A.I. Artificial Intelligence, Steven Spielberg (#2 Amélie,
Jean-Pierre Jeunet)

“What happens when Eyes Wide Shut meets E.T.? What does the audience do? And who is the audience?”
— Chris Herrington, June 28, 2001

2002: #1 City of God, Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund
(#2 Adaptation., Spike Jonze)

“The mise-en-scène of the film is neorealist, but the cinematography, editing, and effects are hyper-stylized, as if The Bicycle Thief had been reimagined through the post-CGI lens of Fight Club or The Matrix.”

— Chris Herrington, April 3, 2003

Lost in Translation

2003: #1 Lost in Translation, Sofia
Coppola (#2 Mystic River, Clint Eastwood)

“Lost in Translation is a film short on plot but rich with incident; nothing much happens, yet every frame is crammed with life and nuance and emotion. … What Coppola seems to be going for here is an ode to human connection that is bigger than (or perhaps just apart from) sex and romance.”
— Chris Herrington, October 2, 2003

2004: #1 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Michel Gondry
(#2 Kill Bill, Quentin Tarantino)

“This is the best film I’ve seen this year and one of the best in recent memory. Funny, witty, charming, and wise, it runs the gamut from comedy to tragedy without falling into either farce or melodrama. Its insights into human loss and redemption are complicated and difficult, well thought out but with the illusion and feel of absolute spontaneity and authentic in its construction — and then deconstruction — of human feelings and memory.”
— Bo List, March 25, 2004

2005: #1 Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee (#2 Hustle & Flow, Craig Brewer)

“The film is a triumph because it creates characters of humanity and anguish, in a setup that could easily become a target for homophobic ridicule. Jack and Ennis are a brave challenge to the stereotyped image of homosexuals in mainstream films, their relations to their families and to each other are truthful and beautifully captured.” — Ben Popper, January 12, 2006

2006: #1 Children of Men,
Alfonso Cuarón (#2 The Proposition, John Hillcoat)

“As aggressively bleak as Children of Men is, it’s ultimately a movie about hope. It’s a nativity story of sort, complete with a manger. And from city to forest to war zone to a lone boat in the sea, it’s a journey you won’t want to miss.”
— Chris Herrington, January 11, 2007

2007 #1 Zodiac, David Fincher
(#2 There Will Be Blood, Paul Thomas Anderson)

“[Zodiac is] termite art, too busy burrowing into its story and characters to bother with what you think.”
— Chris Herrington, March 8, 2007

2008: #1 Frozen River, Courtney Hunt (#2 The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan)

“Frozen River is full of observations of those who are living less than paycheck to paycheck: digging through the couch for lunch money for the kids; buying exactly as much gas as you have change in your pocket; popcorn and Tang for dinner. The American Dream is sought after by the dispossessed, the repossessed, and the pissed off.”
— Greg Akers, August 28, 2008

2009: #1 Where the Wild Things Are, Spike Jonze (#2 Julie & Julia, Nora Ephron)

“I know how ridiculous it is to say something like, ‘Where the Wild Things Are is one of the best kids’ movies in the 70 years since The Wizard of Oz.’ So I won’t. But I’m thinking it.”
— Greg Akers, October 15, 2009

2010: #1 Inception, Christopher Nolan (#2 The Social Network,
David Fincher)

“Nolan has created a complex, challenging cinematic world but one that is thought through and whose rules are well-communicated. But the ingenuity of the film’s concept never supersedes an emotional underpinning that pays off mightily.”
— Chris Herrington, July 15, 2010

2011: #1 The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick (#2 Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Tomas Alfredson)

“The Tree of Life encompasses a level of artistic ambition increasingly rare in modern American movies — Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood might be the closest recent comparison, and I’m not sure it’s all that close. This is a massive achievement. An imperfect film, perhaps, but an utterly essential one.”
— Chris Herrington, June 23, 2011

2012: #1 Zero Dark Thirty, Kathryn Bigelow (#2 Lincoln, Steven Spielberg)

“Zero Dark Thirty is essentially an investigative procedural about an obsessive search for knowledge, not unlike such touchstones as Zodiac or All the President’s Men. And it has an impressive, immersive experiential heft, making much better use of its nearly three-hour running time than any competing award-season behemoth.”
— Chris Herrington, January 10, 2013 

2013: #1 12 Years a Slave, Steve
McQueen (#2 Gravity, Alfonso Cuarón)

“Slavery bent human beings into grotesque shapes, on both sides of the whip. But 12 Years a Slave is more concerned with the end of it. McQueen and screenwriter John Ridley are black. It’s one of those things that shouldn’t be notable but is. If you consider 12 Years a Slave with The Butler and Fruitvale Station, you can see a by-God trend of black filmmakers making mainstream movies about the black experience, something else that shouldn’t be worth mentioning but is.”
— Greg Akers, October 31, 2013