“We are going to do a
terrible thing to you:
We are going to deprive
you of an enemy.”
Soviet political scientist
Georgi Arbatov, to a U.S.
audience in 1988, quoted in
the Financial Times
“Altruism is selfishness
out with a pair of field
glasses and imagination.”
Novelist Christina Stead,
quoted in TheBrowser.com
“There’s nothing sadder
than an old hipster.”
Lenny Bruce, quoted in
The New York Times
“What wisdom can
you find that is greater
than kindness?”
Jean-Jacques
Rousseau, quoted in
WashingtonExaminer.com
“All that you touch /
You Change”
Octavia Butler, quoted
in NPR.org
“Is there anything in
life so disenchanting as
achievement?”
Robert Louis Stevenson,
quoted in Forbes.com
“I don’t need time,
I need a deadline.”
Duke Ellington, quoted
in Parade.comTalking points
Wit &
Wisdom
Ha
sb
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NEWS 17
Poll watch
QA majority of all demo-
graphic groups now
say they are likely to get
vaccinated, except white
Repub li cans. Only 33%
of Repub li cans said they
will definitely take the
vaccine—a higher rate of
vaccine hesitancy than
found among blacks and
Hispanics.
Civiqs
QConsumer confidence has
risen to 54.9 points out of
100 , the highest level since
lockdowns began a year
ago. 61% believe that there
will be a swift economic
recovery, and 43% now say
they are more comfortable
making a major purchase
like a home or a car.
IpsosPotato Head: Now gender-nonconforming
Mr. Potato Head has come out as
“nonbinary,” said Amanda Arnold
in TheCut.com. Hasbro—the
maker of the 70-year-old toy
vegetable—said last week
it was dropping the gender
from the official name and
would refer to him simply as
“Potato Head.” A Hasbro execu-
tive explained that “culture has
evolved,” adding that the “Mr.
and Mrs.” setup was “limiting”
for “both gender identity and
family structure.” In other words,
Hasbro wants to sell Potato Heads
to kids with two mommies or two
daddies. Conservatives threw “a
fit” in response to the news that
“a little plastic potato would no
longer be known as a man,” with one bemoan-
ing the loss “of an apparently important male
figure” and another contending that it was “time
for Republican states to secede.” On Fox News
and its business channel, it was a huge story, said
Alexis Benveniste in CNN.com. Mr. Potato Head
was mentioned no fewer than 35 times by Fox
hosts and a parade of experts who denounced
Hasbro for what they saw as a “left-wing attack
on traditional families.”We conservatives “are freaking out about Mr.
Potato Head not because of some sentimentaland overblown attachment to the child’s
toy,” said Kylee Zempel in The Federalist
.com. Rather, it’s an unmistak-
able symbol of how the Left
won’t stop until they “erase
sex and gender distinc-
tions” from everything.
Just last week, the House
of Representatives passed the
Equality Act, which would osten-
sibly prohibit discrimination but
would in practice eradicate “legal sex
distinctions as we know them,” with
trans kids competing against girls and
showering in their locker rooms. If
progressives have their way, “they’ll
‘Potato Head’ all of America.”A plastic, googly-eyed potato
was hardly a paragon of masculinity, said EJ
Dickson in RollingStone.com. So why are white
conservative men so upset? They’re frantic that
they are losing their majority status and power,
and yearn for a bygone day when men were men,
women were women, and everyone—even toys—
knew their place. In nature, potatoes actually
are gender-nonconforming, said Alex Knapp in
Forbes.com. Each plant possesses both male and
female flowers, as well as the ability to reproduce
asexually. So Hasbro is just making its toy more
true to nature. “Like its earthy ancestor, Potato
Head has interchangeable parts.”“In my house, we have a problem,” said Nicho-
las Goldberg in the Los Angeles Times. “My wife
has been vaccinated; I haven’t.” When she got
her second shot, “I couldn’t help feeling that she
had crossed safely to the other side of a giant
chasm, while I remained at the edge of the cliff.”
She can go out safely while I continue to cower
at home. Like millions of other Americans, I am
suffering from a bad case of vaccine envy. So
far, about 15 percent of the U.S. population has
gotten at least one shot. Vaccinated seniors have
resumed socializing with one another and are
racing to book vacations. For months, we will be
a two-tiered society of “haves and have-nots,”
with the vaccinated returning to “a normality
that remains forbidden to the rest of us.”“I haven’t wished I was older since I was a teen-
ager,” said Karina Bland in The Arizona Repub-
lic. But now, scrolling through social media and
seeing one vaccine selfie after another, “I want
to be 65.” I’m even more jealous of younger
people who meet their state’s eligibility require-
ments, like my friend who qualifies as an educa-
tor because he works for a high school drama
department. When a pharmacist friend got vac-
cinated before me, said Gene Weingarten in TheWashington Post, “I hated her, which filled me
with self-loathing.” The Germans probably have
a word for this complex feeling. “Call it shotten-
freude.” When I finally did book an appointment
after weeks of trying—I’m 69—I felt guilty for
being one of the select few, while tens of millions
still remained unprotected.Vaccine envy will lead to months of vaccine awk-
wardness, said Rachel Gutman in TheAtlantic
.com. Our social interactions will be defined
by who’s protected and who isn’t. Early data
indicate that Covid-19 vaccines “stop at least
some transmission,” but it’s still possible that
vaccinated people can serve as asymptomatic car-
riers and infect others. So if you’ve gotten your
shots, determining what’s safe to do depends on
“whether your neighbors, family, grocery clerks,
delivery drivers, and friends are still vulnerable
to the virus.” The immunized can safely eat
together, and vaccinated seniors can go ahead
and hug their grandkids. But until herd immu-
nity is reached, people who’ve gotten their shots
should still wear masks when in indoor public
places and avoid crowds. If vaccinated people
“throw caution to the wind,” they’ll only be pro-
longing this pandemic nightmare.Vaccine envy: The new national epidemic
Don’t call him ‘mister’