<p>The second wave of the Covid-19 seems to be getting worse with several states reporting biggest-ever daily spike since the outbreak last year. In view of the recent surge in coronavirus cases, several states have imposed new restrictions from capping the number of people in social events to night curfews. "Six states--Maharashtra, Punjab, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Gujarat, and Madhya Pradesh continue to report a surge in the COVID daily new cases. 79.57 per cent of the new cases are reported from these 6 states," the health ministry informed on Saturday.</p> <h3><strong>Check new restrictions states have imposed <br /></strong></h3> <p><strong>Delhi:</strong> The Delhi government on Saturday put a cap of 200 guests in marriage and other events at open-air venues and of 100 people for closed spaces in the city, as per news agency PTI. In an order, Chief Secretary Vijay Dev informed that not more than 50 people will be allowed at funerals in the city. Dev, who is also the chairperson of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority’s (DDMA) state executive committee, said the order will be in force till April 30. He, however, said the status quo will be maintained regarding current permissible and prohibited activities in the city. Also Read: <a href="https://ift.tt/3w4a9A3 Injured As Under-Construction Flyover On Gurugram-Dwarka Expressway Collapses</a></p> <p>Stating the need for the cap on the number of people in marriage, banquet hall, other gatherings, and congregations, and in the funeral, the order said, “In closed spaces, a maximum of 50 per cent of the hall capacity will be allowed, with a ceiling of 100 people, and in open spaces numbers will be allowed keeping the size of the ground/ space in the view, with a ceiling of 200 people subject to strict observance of wearing of face masks, maintaining social distancing, provision for thermal scanning and use of hand wash or sanitiser” .</p> <p>Earlier on Tuesday, the Delhi Disaster Management Authority ordered that there will be no public celebrations in the national capital during upcoming festivals such as Holi and Navaratri."All authorities concerned will ensure that public celebrations and gatherings, congregations during upcoming festivals like Holi, Shab-e-Barat, Navaratri, etc shall not be allowed in public places/public grounds/public parks/markets/religious places etc in NCT of Delhi," Chief Secretary Vijay Dev said in the order.</p> <p>The state government has also set up a number of teams to ensure that people adhere to its directions on Holi. District magistrates and police have created district-wise teams. Legal action would be taken against violators, he said.</p> <p>"For Holi, Shab-e-Barat, Navratri, no gathering allowed at public places. We appeal to the public to follow COVID-19 directives, not drink and drive, and follow traffic rules. There should not be any traffic violations including no riding without a helmet on Holi," said Meenu Chaudhary, Joint Commissioner of Police (CP), Delhi Traffic.</p> <p>Delhi recorded 1,558 coronavirus cases for the third day on a row on Saturday, while 10 more people, the highest in around two-and-a-half months, succumbed to the disease.</p> <p><strong>Maharashtra:</strong> The Maharashtra government has also extended Covid-19 restrictions in the state till April 15. Public places such as beaches and gardens will remain closed from 8 pm to 7 am effective from midnight of March 27. The violation will attract a penalty of ₹1000 per head.</p> <p>"Not wearing of face mask will attract ₹500 fine while the same is ₹1,000 for public spitting," as per the order. It said that holding of social, cultural, political and religious gatherings in the state is being banned completely. Auditoriums or drama theatres should not allow their property to be used for such events, it said.</p> <p>Also, note that social gatherings of all kinds are banned till April 30 across the state. Mumbai Mayor Kishori Pednekar on Saturday announced that residential societies with five or more COVID-19 cases will be sealed by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).</p> <p>"Night curfew in Mumbai may start from 10 pm or 11 pm on March 28. Hotels and pubs to remain closed during the night curfew. Only essential services will be allowed. BMC will seal the residential societies with five or more cases. We are seeing a higher positivity rate in high-rises than in slums and chawls," she added.</p> <p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Gujarat: </strong>The Gujarat has made negative Covid-19 RT-PCR test report mandatory for those arriving from other states. "From April 1 onwards, people entering Gujarat from other states will have to mandatorily show a negative RT-PCR report (not older than 72 hours)," Deputy Chief Minister Nitinbhai Patel, Gujarat. The state has witnessed a surge in cases of coronavirus with Ahmedabad and Surat being the worst affected.</p>
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Saturday, March 27, 2021
Dr. Deborah Birx says every American COVID-19 death after the first 100,000 could've been mitigated, but a Democratic lawmaker says she's to blame for 'enabling' Trump
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- Dr. Deborah Birx said thousands of Americans died preventable COVID-19 deaths.
- During a CNN interview, she said everything after the first surge could've been mitigated.
- But some people, including Rep. Ted Lieu, responded by accusing her of enabling Trump.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
Dr. Deborah Birx, a former member of the White House coronavirus response team, said thousands of Americans died preventable COVID-19 deaths and that everything after the initial surge could've been mitigated.
Birx was speaking during an interview with CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta for the network's upcoming coronavirus documentary that airs Sunday.
A clip of Birx's comments was shared on Saturday.
"I look at it this way: The first time we have an excuse. There were about 100,000 deaths that came from that original surge," said Birx, who served under the Trump administration. "All of the rest of them, in my mind, could have been mitigated or decreased substantially."
According to Birx, more than 80% of American deaths could have been mitigated: At this point, nearly 550,000 people in the US have died from COVID-19, per Johns Hopkins University data. The US reached 100,000 deaths by the end of May 2020.
Read more: Insider found 20 governors haven't gotten their COVID-19 vaccine. Here's who - and why.
Birx was a controversial member of the coronavirus task force and was often criticized for not explicitly pushing back on President Donald Trump when he contradicted the advice of public health officials and medical experts on preventing coronavirus transmission.
-CNN Newsroom (@CNNnewsroom) March 27, 2021
Some of that criticism resurfaced Saturday as the clip of her CNN interview made the rounds on Twitter.
Democratic Rep. Ted Lieu of California, who also served as an impeachment manager against Trump in January, accused Birx of being partly responsible for preventable deaths.
"The malicious incompetence that resulted in hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths starts at the top, with the former President and his enablers," Lieu said in a tweet. "And who was one of his enablers? Dr. Birx, who was afraid to challenge his unscientific rhetoric and wrongfully praised him."
Many others on Twitter chimed in as well, accusing Birx of being complicit. Some also recirculated an old clip from March 2020 in which Birx praised Trump as being "attentive to the scientific literature and the details and the data."
She has since said she liked working on the road under the Trump administration because she wasn't "censored" like she was at the White House.
Another doctor interviewed by CNN Saturday said he agreed with Birx about the preventable COVID-19 deaths, but that it "happened on her watch."
"She was the White House pandemic coordinator. This was her job," Dr. Jonathan Reiner of George Washington University said. "And if things weren't being done to her liking, her duty was to stand up and speak up."
As for how many deaths were preventable, Reiner compared the US to Germany, a country he says had a "mediocre" pandemic response. And yet if the US had a similar number of deaths per capita as Germany did, only 300,000 Americans would be dead.
"A quarter of a million Americans would be alive today," he said.
Have a news tip? Contact this reporter at kvlamis@insider.com.
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Amarnath Yatra 2021: Health Certificates Must For Annual Pilgrimage; Online Registration From April 1
<p>The annual Amarnath Yarta is set to commence from June 28 this year and will culminate on the Raksha Bandhan festival which falls on August 22. The registration process for the 56-day long annual pilgrimage to the holy cave shrine of Amarnathji in south Kashmir Himalayas will begin from April 1. </p> <p>According to the reports, the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board (SASB) has decided to begin the registration process next week through 446 designated branches of Punjab National Bank, Jammu and Kashmir Bank and YES bank in 27 states and Union Territories.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <a href="https://ift.tt/3w2v2LP Covid Surge: Night Curfew From Today; Heavy Fines For Violators As Govt Imposes Fresh Curbs</a></strong></p> <p>News agency PTI quoted SASB Chief Executive Officer Nitishwar Kumar saying that the "registration will start from April 1 for both the routes through 446 designated bank branches of the Punjab National Bank (316), the Jammu and Kashmir Bank (90) and the YES Bank (40), all over the country." </p> <p>Kumar further said that as the shrine is at a very high-altitude and the journey is arduous, it is mandatory to submit health certificates issued by doctors or medical institutes authorised by state governments or union territory administrations. The certificates issued after March 15 shall be valid and will be accepted at the registered bank branches. </p> <p>In a meeting earlier this month, the authorities had said that the board has decided to hold the event, keeping with the COVID-19 pandemic guidelines. It also assured to continue the live telecast/ virtual darshan of the morning and evening Aarti besides the traditional rituals as per past practices.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <a href="https://ift.tt/3u0N0g4 To Sell 100% Stake In Air India To Private Player By May-June: Union Min Hardeep Puri</a></strong></p> <p>It is to be noted that the SASB board had cancelled the Amarnath Yatra last year in 2020 saying that yatra would begin July 21 and continue till August 3, however, the decision was rolled back. It was restricted to a group of Sadhus last year due to coronavirus pandemic, while a year earlier it was called off mid-way due to a "terror threat."</p>
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Maharashtra Covid Surge: Night Curfew From Today; Heavy Fines For Violators As Govt Imposes Fresh Curbs | 10 Points
<p>With Maharashtra continuing to witness a surge in cases and rising mortality due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray-led government in a bid to contain the spread of the virus on Saturday released the ‘Mission Begin Again’ guidelines to be applicable in the state from tonight to April 15.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ </strong>| <strong><a href="https://ift.tt/3rw5pzA" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><span style="color: #e03e2d;">India Witnesses Highest Covid-19 Spike In Over 5 Months With More Than 62,000 New Cases Reported</span></a></strong></p> <p>The decision comes as Maharashtra has reported the highest daily new cases at 36,902. The state has also witnessed the maximum casualties in the last 24 hours as 112 people lost their lives battling the virus.</p> <h3><strong>Check the guidelines issued by Maharashtra govt</strong></h3> <p><strong>1.</strong> Wearing face covers and masks mandatory in public places, including offices, and during travel.</p> <p><strong>2.</strong> Social distancing must be followed in public places with the people maintaining a minimum distance of six feet in public. Provision of thermal screening, hand wash and sanitiser to be made available at entry and exit points of common areas.</p> <p><strong>3.</strong> Cinema halls, malls, auditoriums and restaurants to remain shut from 8 p.m. till 7 a.m. The permission has, however, been given for home deliveries.</p> <p><strong>4.</strong> Night curfew and strict regulations will be enforced from 8 p.m. till 7 a.m. The violators will be fined for flouting the orders, which will include a penalty of Rs 1,000 for flouting night curfew rules and Rs 500 fine for not wearing masks. In addition, spitting in public places will be punishable with a fine as per the area regulations.</p> <p><strong>5.</strong> Consumption of liquor, paan and other tobacco related products not allowed in public places.</p> <p><strong>6.</strong> Work from home to continue.</p> <p><strong>7.</strong> The government has encouraged the practice of work from home for companies while staggering the work hours.</p> <p><strong>8.</strong> Frequent sanitisation of common facilities, workplaces between shifts. Employees to ensure adequate physical distancing, staggered work hours and lunch breaks.</p> <p><strong>9.</strong> All private offices to operate at 50 percent capacity. Health and other essential services excluded from this rule.</p> <p><strong>10.</strong> No social, cultural, political and religious gatherings to be allowed in the state.</p>
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What is it like to drive the Perseverance rover remotely? A NASA engineer explains the challenges of piloting the vehicle's journey across Mars.
AP
- Insider spoke to Heather Justice, a NASA Mars Perseverance driver, who operates the rover remotely.
- The team has set up a successful operation but there are still a few challenges that drivers face.
- Justice indicated that maintaining a work-life balance was tough.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
It's been about a year since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic and like most companies, NASA is still dealing with the ongoing effects and challenges posed by the crisis. But unlike other firms, the US space agency is doing so while also presiding over a hugely ambitious mission to Mars.
For engineers and scientists working on the Mars 2020 mission with its Perseverance rover at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, one of the key challenges is adjusting to new styles of working. This means that some rover drivers have adopted a hybrid-working model, for example.
Insider spoke to Heather Justice, a NASA engineer from the Perseverance rover team, about the challenges of driving the machine. She also explained how she manages to perform commands and make new scientific discoveries during a pandemic while operating on Mars time.
Justice has worked at NASA since 2011 and works on the Mars 2020 mission as a rover driver. She was the lead driver for the Opportunity rover, which travelled over 45 km and was operational on Mars from 2004 to 2018.
Faced with lockdowns and social-distancing restrictions, she explained the teams' changed way of operating Perseverance, which launched on July 30 2020, and working together as a team. "It's definitely a little different from operating a brand new rover on Mars," she said.
In normal circumstances with past rovers, all of the team would come to JPL and get together and work together on operations for the first two months. "It's a group bonding experience for all the engineers and scientists working together," said Justice.
She added: "As rover drivers, we also do our own little huddle thing where we'll look at the images and say: 'OK this part of the terrain looks steep, or 'this part looks like there might be some risks to how we want to drive'. Now, we can't really do that. We can't all get together all close around a computer right now so that does make it a little bit more challenging."
The Perseverance team has had to think about different ways of working, given the effects of the pandemic. The team was used to working in an organized facility filled with lots of large rooms, where all the scientists and engineers would congregate.
"Instead we have just a few primary engineering roles that really need to be collaborating on lab who are in there but spread out across new work stations that are really far apart," Justice said. "We're sort of like yelling to each other from our separate workstations, but it makes it a little easier to collaborate without having to stress so much about all of the virtual meetings."
One particular challenge has arisen from the fact that teams cannot huddle around a computer to discuss where the rover is going to drive. Instead, scientists and engineers have to put together all of the sequences that will eventually command the rover each day through teleconferencing systems.
Justice said this is a popular way of communication between the teams, who are all spread out across work stations due to social-distancing restrictions. Simultaneously, remote team members who are responsible for the navigation camera, have to coordinate with the rover drivers in laboratories to obtain images they need of the terrain.
But for Justice, there has definitely been a lot of improvement and evolution in the process of driving rovers. Some of that has been a focus on the flight systems side, where they've tried to make Perseverance more capable.
She said: "An example of that would be the autonomous navigation where we've done a lot of improvements on the software so that the rover can drive further on its own. Hopefully in the long term that will make it easier for us to get longer drives in which will let us get to the places that science really wants us to go to."
There have also been hardware improvements, where the wheels are different from Curiosity so that they are more robust to drive over sharp rocks," she added.
AP
Preparation was key for Justice before she immersed herself into the Mars mission. "I was very good about making sure that any major chores that had to be done during this time period were done in advance," she said. "I also made sure I stocked up on food because I don't know what time I'm going to be able to get to a grocery store to buy food if it's in the middle of the night when I'm trying to eat."
When asked how she managed her work-life balance, Justice indicated that it was tough. "We're working weekends too, it's 7 days a week so there definitely was a period where I forgot what day of the week it was."
"It's not like you have your general eight-hour workday and you go home and you stop thinking about it," Justice said.
Then, of course, there's the additional challenge of working on Mars time: "You're working and sleeping at weird hours and it changes every day - you don't really have a consistent schedule," she added.
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PM Modi Hands Over 1.2 Mn Covid-19 Vaccine Doses, 109 Ambulances To Bangladesh During Dhaka Visit
<p>India, as a part of its vaccine diplomacy programme, gifted 1.2 million doses of domestically produced Covid-19 vaccine to Bangladesh. During his two-day visit to the neighbouring Bangladesh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday handed over a representational box to Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina as a symbol of India's gift. He also handed over a representational key of 109 life-saving ambulances to Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina in Dhaka. </p> <p><strong>ALSO READ |<a href="https://ift.tt/3lVQrSl"> 'India Will Upgrade One Girls Middle School, Set Up Primary School In Orakandi': PM Modi In Bangladesh</a></strong></p> <p>Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi in a Tweet, shared the visuals saying, "1.2 million doses of Made in India Covid vaccines as grant from India to Bangladesh were handed over by Prime Minister @narendramodi to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina."</p> <p><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">“<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/VaccineMaitri?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#VaccineMaitri</a>” to overcome Covid! <br><br>1.2 million doses of Made in India Covid vaccines as grant from India to Bangladesh were handed over by Prime Minister <a href="https://twitter.com/narendramodi?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@narendramodi</a> to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. <a href="https://t.co/4iGL523pQw">pic.twitter.com/4iGL523pQw</a></p>&mdash; Arindam Bagchi (@MEAIndia) <a href="https://twitter.com/MEAIndia/status/1375808842626260993?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 27, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script></p> <p>The Indian PM in on a visit to Dhaka at the invitation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to celebrate Mujib Borsho- the birth centenary of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman; 50 years of the establishment of diplomatic ties between India and Bangladesh; and 50 years of Bangladesh’s war of liberation.</p> <p>Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his address yesterday thanked all the dignitaries, highlighted the significance of this occasion and touched upon various facets of bilateral relationship of the two countries.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <a href="https://ift.tt/31oGyDf Complain To EC': Mamata Banerjee Lashes Out At PM Modi For 'Vote Marketing' In Bangladesh</a></strong></p> <p>He also handed over Gandhi Peace Prize 2020 posthumously conferred to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman to Sheikh Rehana, younger daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman accompanied by her sister Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. This award was conferred in recognition of his outstanding contributions towards social, economic and political transformation through non-violent and other Gandhian methods. </p> <p>Meanwhile, Hasina on Saturday presented a gold and a silver coin released on the occasion of the birth centenary of her father and Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman to Modi. </p>
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A $400,000 house got 122 offers in 2 days, highlighting the desperate frenzy buyers are facing amid skyrocketing real-estate prices and a dearth of homes for sale
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- A central California home for sale received 122 offers in a single weekend.
- The selling price was "in the mid-$400,000 range," according to Fox affiliate KTXL.
- It's a symptom of a soaring real estate market where inventory is low and demand is high.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
A California home received 122 offers in a single weekend amid a skyrocketing US real estate market.
The 1,400-square-foot home - located in Citrus Heights, California, a suburb of Sacramento - was listed at $399,900. It spans 1,400 square feet and has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a swimming pool, according to a report from KTXL, the local Fox affiliate.
The house received 122 offers in two days, including one above $500,000, and has since been sold for an undisclosed amount - KTXL reports the selling price was "in the mid-$400,000 range."
The home's current owners predicted they would receive eight or 10 offers for their home. They're planning to move to Idaho, KTXL reports.
Read more: It's actually a horrible time to buy a house
The unprecedented number of offers is a symptom of a pandemic-related surge in home sales. According to a September report from the National Association of Realtors, existing home sales reached a 14-year high last August. Similarly, housing inventory hit a record low in September, and dipped even lower one month later to 2.5 months of supply.
Those who already own homes are opting not to sell, and new home construction has dipped over the years. But according to Bloomberg, new home construction rose to a new high last August, its highest since 2006.
Given the low inventory, home prices are also on the rise. Prices soared through the end of 2020, jumping the most in seven years by December, according to the S&P Case-Shiller US home-price index. Phoenix, Seattle, and San Diego saw price increases among the 19 cities surveyed.
A rush to buy up homes may lead to regret for new homeowners
The real estate frenzy is driven by a combination of factors. Mortgage rates hit record lows a dozen times in 2020 alone, and the pandemic induced a desire for outdoor space or a more comfortable work-from-home arrangement.
According to research from investment management firm Cowen and Company published late last year, there's been a noticeable migration among people ages 25 to 34 from urban areas to suburban ones. Among the 2,700 people Cowen surveyed, 48% of millennials reported living in the suburbs compared with 44% in 2019.
Those who reported living in cities fell to 35%, down from 38% last year.
"This suburbanization trend has been slowly occurring since 2017, and we expect it to accelerate with the COVID-19 disruption," Cowen analyst John Kernan wrote. "These results are also corroborated by a shift in home ownership."
The rush to snap up homes during the pandemic has already led to regrets for many buyers. The Wall Street Journal's Candace Taylor reported last month that buyers were making hasty purchases, skipping due diligence, and waiving inspections. One family discovered a wasp infestation after closing on the house, while another learning they'd have to spend $150,000 on siding to alleviate a woodpecker issue.
A LendEDU survey from September found that roughly 55% of Americans who bought houses during the pandemic reported buyer's remorse - 30% of those people said they should have waiting to buy a home for financial reasons.
Scott Trench, the CEO of the real-estate-investing resource BiggerPockets, recently told Insider's Taylor Borden that it may not make sense to try to buy a house right now.
"Frantically trying to buy 'something' is a great way to make a bad purchase," he said.
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I sat through Chuck Lorre's cringe new Afghan War sitcom in Kabul so you don't have to
Robert Voets/CBS via Getty Images
- "United States of Al" will premier on April 1 on CBS.
- The odd-couple sitcom is about a U.S. Marine who helps his Afghan interpreter come to America.
- The author of this review, Ali Latifi, is based in Kabul and got an advance look at two episodes.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
Kabul - Last week a tweet appeared in my timeline criticizing the trailer of a new CBS sitcom about a US Marine who brings his Afghan interpreter to America.
"This is a real TV show. Actually made by human people. On Planet Earth. In 2021," it read.
I watched the 30-second trailer and was horrified to see that the show -- the first sitcom I knew of where a central character is from Afghanistan -- seemed to rely on tired tropes about a hulking, heroic white man coming to the rescue of his bumbling brown sidekick. Reza Aslan, the Iranian-American author who serves an executive producer on the show, asked that we give the show a chance.
-Saeed Taji Farouky (@saeedtaji) March 19, 2021
"United States of Al" premieres April 1 on CBS. But as an Afghan-American journalist based in Kabul, I was recently invited to a Zoom screening of the pilot and 5th episode.
I tried to hold out hope it would be good. It wasn't. In fact, the original tweet from Saeed Taji Farouky, an Arab-British filmmaker, was spot-on. Rather than bringing nuance to an Afghan-American pairing, the Chuck Lorre production is a show from another era: it's all flat characters, and cheap, uninspired jokes.
It's also a missed opportunity. The show tries to win points for putting Afghanistan at the center of a heavily-promoted mainstream sitcom, but then puts in none of the work.
It's as if Blackish, Fresh Off the Boat and Rami, all of which offer interesting, funny observations about the lives of non-white protagonists, never happened, and Hollywood (or at least CBS) has learned nothing since I first arrived in the United States in the late-1980s.
To be clear, this is a sitcom and not a prestige TV treatise on cultural imperialism and post-Cold War politics -- and it doesn't pretend to be something it's not. But as someone who will happily spend hours cycling through clips of Amy Farrah Fowler and Sheldon Cooper from Chuck Lorre's The Big Bang Theory, this show is cringe.
Afghanistan is a real place with complex problems, many of which have been exacerbated by nearly four decades of invasions and interference by foreign powers. Among the things Al never says to this nice family in Ohio is that last year more than 3,000 civilians were killed in Afghanistan. After the credits, we get a glance of Awalmir and Riley working together, or rather fleeing enemy fire in a Humvee through nondescript desert meant to be Helmand. It's played for laughs as a wild bonding experience. But the truth is that for Afghan interpreters who worked alongside
US and NATO forces were seen locally as collaborators and became targets for the Taliban. Dreams that they would become refugees in America often didn't materialize.
But here we're told it's Riley who heroically spent three years filling out paperwork to get Awalmir to America.
In a recent Clubhouse chat, my friend Mariam Wardak, an Afghan-American who splits her time between DC and Kabul, put it well: "Rather than showing Afghan interpreters as brave men who are putting their lives on the line and are risking being ostracized in their community, we have a short, scrawny awkward brown man standing next to this GI Joe."
Robert Voets/CBS via Getty Images
The first clue of what we were in for came with the pairing: Riley (Parker Young), the buff, tattooed, Marine, towers over Awalmir (Adhir Kalyan), the squat, skinny brown man with a funny accent. While Riley gets to flirty banter with an attractive female bartender, and show off his physique boxing in the garage, Awalmir plays the wide-eyed, non-threatening Asian man staring in wonder at the bounty of Cleveland's grocery store aisles.
Then there's the dialogue.
The pilot opens with Riley and his sister, Elizabeth (Elizabeth Alderfer), at an airport awaiting the titular character's arrival to the United States. Riley passes the time telling the story of the time Al greeted Riley at an airport in Afghanistan with a bowl of pacha. (American troops don't arrive in Afghanistan in this manner, but that's perhaps for another time.)
Elizabeth, badly butchering the word, asks what pacha is. When Riley describes it as sheep's head soup, Elizabeth is clearly revolted and the studio audience erupts in laughter. Personally, pacha is not my cup of tea. But surely, the writer's room could have done better than tired jokes about weird, foreign foods.
The inane jokes continue. At one point, when Al recalls a memory from Kabul, Elizabeth makes a seemingly nonsensical reference to spring break, leading to an eventual punchline about confusing Kabul with Cabo. At another, Awalmir compares his awkward attempt to reunite Riley and his estranged wife to negotiating with warlords, and something about enemy fire in Helmand.
Now granted, it could be worse. Al is not a terrorist, unlike the Arab and Muslim characters who populated shows like 24 (which, by the way, aired on Afghan TV for years). When he prays, it is to find solace from his loneliness, not because he's about to blow himself up.
As a friend of mine, who also attended the advance screening, said: "It's a hell of a lot better than him being another Afghan terrorist on TV."
But if you're going to go to the trouble of making this show, and airing it on a network that has faced years of criticism for its white, homogeneous presentation of the world, why not endow Al with at least a smattering of complexity? If the creators had allowed Afghanistan to be a real place (and not just the vague origin story for another odd couple buddy comedy), have some faith that American viewers just might be able to follow along.
But, the worst part is that I desperately wanted this terrible show to be great.
You see, I grew up on sitcoms.
My family fled the Soviet occupation and ended up in Fremont, California, a city that would come to be known as 'Little Kabul.'
As a kid, I would often sit on the floor of my parents' bedroom, a bowl of cumin and saffron-scented palow in front of me, and follow the ups and downs of the home lives of the Winslows, the Taylors, the Bundys, the Banks and the Conners. It was my first introduction to what I thought was American life.
Most of my social interactions in Fremont were with my large, extended Afghan family. Even in school, all of my friends were Afghan, Arab, Desi, Filipino, or Latino. I would watch American sitcoms, wondering why the children had so few cousins around, why their homes were never full of dozens of family members gathering for a meal and, most importantly, what exactly meatloaf, fruit cakes and French toast were. These shows educated me on the lives of the 'Amrikaya,' as we called them.
Still, I longed for a TV show about people who sounded, acted and looked like me.
John Moore/Getty Images
In college, I interned at the Center for Asian American Media, which ran the nation's largest Asian-American film festival. Around the office, there was a lot of excitement about the coming Harold and Kumar sequel, and I was confused as to why a dumb stoner movie was receiving so much praise from the 20 and 30-something Filpino, Chinese, Korean and Japanese-Americans cinephiles I worked with.
"Because, Ali, it's about them being dumb stoners, not a Korean and an Indian," they said to me. I rewatched the first movie and saw their point. Yes, Harold and Kumar were Asian, but they were also American. And more importantly, John Cho went from just being "that Asian guy from American Pie" and Kal Penn from "that Indian guy in Van Wilder" to genuine stars.
Which brings me back to The United States of Al.
I'm back in Afghanistan, where I work as a journalist and spend a lot of my time trying to demonstrate to a global audience that people who come from here are just as compelling and layered as the Rileys and Elizabeths of Cleveland.
To be sure, I'm going to watch the rest of United States of Al.
And if it gets better, I'll be the first to cheer it on.
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Freelancers are freaking out about the PRO Act. Here is why they should - and shouldn't - be worried.
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- The PRO Act, which passed in the House, includes a metric for reclassifying workers that freelancers object to.
- Many independent contractors don't object to the right to collective bargaining, but worry the bill could set a dangerous precedent.
- Lawmakers must strip the "ABC test" from the bill.
- Larry Buhl is a multimedia journalist, author, and podcast host.
- This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
Back in 2019, I predicted that California Assembly Bill 5 (AB5), which upset the independent contractor world by reclassifying freelancers in hundreds of occupations as employees unless they could prove they're not, would be seen by other lawmakers as a road map, rather than a cautionary tale. And here we are: a new bill working its way through Congress, the Protecting the Right to Organize Act of 2021 - or PRO Act - should give independent contractors across the country reason to worry, though not necessarily because of the intent of the legislation.
The ABC test
What made AB5 so problematic was its reliance on the ABC employment test to classify workers. ABC says a freelancer should be an employee, unless:
"A) The worker is free from the control and direction of the hiring entity in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of the work and in fact; and
B) The worker performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity's business; and
C) The worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed."
The worker must meet all three. Part B is where many independent contractors went through the buzzsaw: If you're in the same business as a client, you must be an employee, and, presumably the company would hire you, even if you've only been putting in a few hours a week for them. Yet, instead, most employers are just not working with California freelancers anymore.
ABC is also the basis for reclassification in the PRO Act, which passed the House of Representatives earlier this month with bipartisan support. However, there's one big difference: While AB5 reclassified employment status for workers in California, the PRO Act reclassifies freelancers nationally, but only for the purpose of collective bargaining rights. That's all - or so it states. Supporters say it "levels the playing field" for unions, to give more people the right to vote in union elections.
I spoke with Professor Michael LeRoy, an expert in labor law and labor relations at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, to find out whether freelancers should worry about the PRO Act. He said there's been some hyperbole and misunderstanding about it.
"Does [the PRO Act] force you to be in a union? No. If 10 million [freelancers] are classified as employees, a certain amount will want to form one or join one, but they could also vote no," he told me.
I'd be okay with more people being able to collectively bargain if they want. Freelancers I spoke with aren't apoplectic about theoretical pressure to join a union, either. What does concern us greatly is the ABC test being used to reclassify independent contractors for any reason. Almost everyone I spoke with feared the ABC test would be misapplied by companies who read the reclassification part of the law, but miss the part about unions. Freelancers also worry that the ABC test will set a precedent for future legislation. It already has: Several states used AB5 as a model when proposing new "gig worker protection laws."
Unintended consequences
Fred Topel, a Los Angeles-based entertainment journalist and co-leader of California Freelance Writers United (CAFWU), implored national lawmakers to not use the ABC test. "If you take out the ABC test, I think a majority of [CAFWU] members would support it. We've seen no evidence that AB5 worked as lawmakers intended, but plenty of evidence of unintended negative consequences from the ABC test," he said.
Robert Sette, a freelance translator in Denver, predicted that any big change to labor laws using the ABC test would make hiring companies think twice about using independent contractors. "Many won't see [the PRO Act] as only for labor organizing. They'll see this as a risk management issue. To avoid possibly running afoul of the law, they'll cut loose freelancers."
That did happen in California. The Facebook group Freelancers Against AB5 has been compiling personal stories of independent contractors in California who lost work and income directly as a result of that law, well before the COVID-19 crisis. Based on dozens of "no Californians need apply" notices citing AB5 as the reason, it appears that many companies were so bewildered by the law and scared of fines for possibly violating it, they simply gave up on California independent contractors.
The road to career hell was paved with good intentions
After AB5 passed, I joined CAFWU and other advocates in California to petition state representatives to amend the law. We succeeded in getting exemptions for some professions.
Through the process, we learned that most lawmakers had no clue about the scope of the independent contractor world, and assumed most people deriving an income were either employers, employees, or exploited would-be employees. The bill's biggest proponents said, in so many words: Don't worry if you lose work because all your clients will hire you full time, with benefits! We explained that's not how it works, emphasizing that most independent contractors are thriving professionals.
I recognize that some independent contractors do want full-time work, and that many other workers are truly misclassified and exploited. There should be protections from misclassification, except - there already are laws covering that. Any worker can sue for misclassification right now - albeit with difficulty.
We don't need new laws that help some, but also legislate hundreds of thousands of successful careers out of existence. LeRoy agreed the ABC test is a blunt tool that "oversimplifies" the labor force and would need "significant refinements" and exemptions if kept in place. A potential solution could be a multi-factor balancing framework to determine who's an employee, one like the IRS uses.
In order to prevent the ABC test from wreaking havoc on more independent contractors' lives, constituents must start conversations with their representatives, starting with the Senate subcommittee members that will be discussing it. They could point to surveys showing that 30% of the US workforce is either self-employed or hired by the self-employed and estimates that freelance income is nearly 5% of GDP.
Stripping the ABC test from the PRO Act could prevent lawmakers from proposing more damaging bills, like the one written last year by Democratic Senators Patty Murray of Washington and Sherrod Brown of Ohio. Their bill gives some benefits to temp and gig workers, but, like AB5, it uses the ABC test to sweep all professions into its net.
This shouldn't be a partisan issue, but sadly it is. Many Republicans insist any labor protections will hurt business and therefore can never be considered. Based on comments from AB5's proponents, many Democrats assume what's good for unions surely benefits everyone. Labor classifications must be more nuanced than that because today's labor market is complicated.
Pro-labor lawmakers need to understand that freelancers are not necessarily suffering gig workers, or getting by until they land a "real job." They should either toughen enforcement of existing laws or make sure new laws explicitly help workers who need protections, but not hinder independent contractors' ability to earn a living. Labor law shouldn't be a zero sum game.
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The pandemic completely unraveled the libertarian ideal of individualism in Ayn Rand's 'Atlas Shrugged'
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- Paul Constant is a writer at Civic Ventures and cohost of the "Pitchfork Economics" podcast with Nick Hanauer and David Goldstein.
- In the latest episode, they spoke with evolutionist David Sloan Wilson about his novel, "Atlas Hugged."
- Wilson says the pandemic has unraveled the Ayn Rand philosophy that self-interest should trump societal needs.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
Like a lot of white males, I read Ayn Rand's bestselling novel "Atlas Shrugged" when I was 18. And like a lot of white males, "Atlas Shrugged" turned me into a huge jerk for a couple of months.
"Atlas Shrugged," which was published in 1959 and came in second only after The Bible in a Library of Congress survey of influential books, is a 1,200-page sci-fi novel about what would happen if all the "makers" in the world were to go on strike. The mysterious hero of the book, John Galt, encourages captains of industry, inventors, and other heroes of capitalism to join him in a secret utopia hidden in Colorado called Galt's Gulch. The rest of the world - populated only by collectivists, politicians, and other assorted "takers" - quickly begins to fall apart without them.
"Atlas Shrugged" serves as a page-turning enticement to Ayn Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, which is based on the idea that selfishness should be the guiding virtue for all mankind. (If you think I'm overstating or mischaracterizing her message, please note that Rand literally published a non-fiction book titled "The Virtue of Selfishness.")
Self-interest, Rand argues, is the best motivation for economics, finance, politics, and basically all of humanity's pursuits. Putting others first, she argues, means that everyone finishes last.
The appeal of selfishness
Rand's simplistic Objectivist worldview couldn't be better designed to appeal to sheltered middle-and-upper-class suburban white boys like me - the kind of people who, in the immortal words of Barry Switzer, were born on third base and thought they hit a triple.
For kids like me at the time, Rand's message that we earned every piece of wealth that we inherited was a comforting one, and it pleased our egos by centering us as masters of the universe who deserved our elevated perch.
Thankfully, it didn't take me too long to shake off the themes of "Atlas Shrugged." As soon as I befriended people who were not suburban white dudes, and once I understood that they had to work five times as hard to enjoy half of the privilege that I enjoyed, I realized that Rand was singing a heroic ode to the comfortable. With the application of a little bit of empathy and life experience, her philosophy fell apart.
But plenty of powerful adults still subscribe to Rand's philosophy. Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan has spoken often, and lovingly, about the impact Rand had on his life. Former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan was a Randian acolyte, along with both Ron and Rand Paul. Some of Silicon Valley's most powerful players, including Peter Thiel and Travis Kalanick, have praised Rand.
Her writing to this day informs a particularly virulent form of conservative thought - fiercely libertarian, aggressively anti-government, blindly in favor of handing power to corporations.
In this week's episode of "Pitchfork Economics," Nick Hanauer and David Goldstein talk with celebrated evolutionist David Sloan Wilson about his debut novel, "Atlas Hugged." "Hugged" rebuts the claims of Shrugged using Sloan's unparalleled understanding of evolutionary biology, which reframes humans as cooperative and community-minded animals and not mono-maniacally selfish actors.
Self-interest versus the pandemic
And for a ripped-from-the-headlines example of why humans are absolutely not the sociopathic strivers of Rand's fiction, look no further than the pandemic. How would Galt's Gulch have responded last year when COVID-19 arrived?
To begin with, none of Rand's rugged individualist protagonists would abide by a mask mandate. They loathe government regulations of all types, and since mask-wearing protects other people as much as it does the person wearing the mask, it violates Rand's primary directive of selfishness above all else. The same goes for six-foot social distancing rules.
So already, Galt's Gulch looks like a petri dish for coronavirus. Rand envisioned her utopia as a haven for CEOs and presidents of big manufacturing firms, and the average age of CEOs in America has climbed in recent years to just under 60 years old. Given that 95% of all coronavirus deaths have been in people over 60 years old, the survival rate for Galt's Gulch isn't looking great.
I hear the protests now: "But surely these unfettered capitalists would be able to buy or manufacture ventilators to keep those infected CEOs alive?" Probably not.
If you recall, ventilators were in high demand in the early days of the pandemic, and then-President Trump had to use powers of government to force General Motors to manufacture them - a gross violation of Rand's philosophy.
And the global supply chain was completely broken in those early days, meaning all the money in the world couldn't get ventilators or the parts to manufacture ventilators to Galt's Gulch in time to save those poor sickened Objectivists.
Then consider the fact that Galt's Gulch likely has no public health department to inform the populace about at-risk behaviors and demographics, no way to direct private business in ways that benefit the public good without massive price-gouging, and no tax dollars to support people who lose their jobs because of the pandemic, and John Galt's utopia is starting to look a lot like "The Hunger Games."
The science fiction of individualism
There's a reason why libertarians have been so quiet since COVID arrived on our shores a year ago, and why Republican hyper-conservatives were bleating about Dr. Seuss when Democrats were passing an incredibly popular pandemic relief package.
The pandemic is proof of the single inescapable fact that destroys Ayn Rand's philosophy: We live in a society, and nobody is truly a self-made master of their own destiny. The sooner we understand the American ideal of sovereign individualism is the stuff of science-fiction, the faster we can get to work building a world that's better for everyone.
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Some airlines are giving travelers another year to use travel credits before they expire
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- United Airlines, American Airlines, and Delta Air Lines have extended travel credits into 2022.
- Travelers that have canceled flights during the pandemic now have an extra year to rebook.
- Airlines chose to give customers travel credits instead of refunds to maintain cash reserves.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
Waves of flight cancellations last year resulted in airlines issuing credits or vouchers instead of cash, with the promise that they could be used for future travel once customers were ready. For many, those credits close to expiring, even though a lot of Americans are still not comfortable traveling.
Some US airlines are responding to travel-hesitant customers by extending the deadline for flights credits so that customers can have more time to plan trips, especially as most of the country still has not received a COVID-19 vaccine.
United Airlines travelers now have until March 31, 2022, to use their "future flight credits" from trips canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic. "Take advantage of your flight credit by booking a flight on or before March 31, 2022, for a trip within the next year," United told flyers in an email.
American Airlines is offering a similar policy for voluntarily canceled tickets during the pandemic. "Flight credit issued for flights voluntarily canceled by customers during the COVID-19 flexible period can be used for travel through March 31, 2022," the airline's website says. Credits usually expire one year from their issuance.
Delta Air Lines is letting flyers who had to cancel tickets booked before April 17, 2020, use their credits for travel until December 31, 2022, the longest of the big three US airlines.
Airlines have also made it easier to book flights on their websites using the credits, though some trips require a phone call to the airline for the credit to be applied. Credits can often be used for extras like paying for seat assignments, if the flight doesn't use the full amount.
Flyers using their credits to make new bookings can also take advantage of new flexible cancellation policies. All three have largely done away with change and cancellation fees for most tickets, allowing customers to book a trip and change it at their desire if they're not ready to travel.
The only caveat is that the difference in fare has to be paid each time if the new trip dates result in higher fares. Basic economy tickets and some international flights are also not included in the scheme, though each airline is different.
More Americans have been taking to the skies in February and March, according to Transportation Security Administration data, than during most months in 2020. For that, airlines can thank an accelerated vaccine rollout and the passage of a stimulus bill that gave many Americans an extra $1,400 in their bank accounts.
Airlines chose to give travel credits instead of cash refunds at the pandemic's peak as they needed cash reserves to weather the pandemic. Cancellations exceeded bookings for most carriers once the coronavirus spread across borders and continents, and traveler numbers dropped to their lowest levels in decades.
Just over one year in, however, airlines are becoming cash positive once more.
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