How to Stay Sane in an Pandemic
Bob Zadek’s advice on being more selective about what you read about Coronavirus
This Sunday, Bob hosts Jacob Sullum – Senior Editor at Reason Magazine — on his reasoned writings about the coronavirus panic and resulting economic shutdown.
Tune in LIVE, March 29 — 8–9am PACIFIC — for a selective, skeptical, and non-sensational discussion of what’s happening in America and around the world.
What is Bob reading?
Reason.com’s Coronavirus Coverage
- Two Reasons the Worst-Case Scenarios for COVID-19 Seem Unrealistic by Jacob Sullum, March 23
- Only Social Darwinians Worry About the Harm Caused by COVID-19 Lockdowns, Andrew Cuomo Says, by Jacob Sullum, March 24
- Trump Is Right To Worry About the Cost of Aggressive COVID-19 Control Measures, by Jacob Sullum, March 25
- We Will Regret Not Taking the Economic Effects of Mass Quarantine More Seriously, by Nick Gillespie
- Trump’s Top Trade Official Says China Tariffs Didn’t Harm Coronavirus Preparedness. Don’t Buy His Spin. by Erich Boehm
- Richard Epstein Cops to a ‘Stupid Gaffe’ in Controversial Coronavirus Essay That Caught Trump Administration Attention by Nick Gillespie
On the Economic Overreaction
- Donald Boudreaux: Globalization, wealth & health | TribLIVE.com
- Coronavirus and Politicians vs. the Economy | Cato @ Liberty by Chris Edwards
- Beware of Panic Policymaking | AIER by Veronique de Rugy
Epidemiological Research
- In the coronavirus pandemic, we’re making decisions without reliable data By JOHN P.A. IOANNIDIS | MARCH 17, 2020
- How Mass Hysteria Is Making Coronavirus Worse Than It Actually Is — Worth.com, By Joon Yun, March 2, 2020
Constitutional Considerations:
TRANSCRIPT
Newly Discovered Cases ≠ New Cases
Craig Roberts: Welcome back this Wednesday the 24th of March. As we make our way to a deeper understanding of what’s happening, there’s an awful lot of conflicting information out there. While this is very serious, I wonder if the reaction is in line with the threat to the United States — not just to our physical health, but to our national wellbeing and certainly economic health.
Joining me now is syndicated talk show host and best-selling author Bob Zadek. Bob is the host of The Bob Zadek Show, heard every Sunday morning at 8am on our sister station 860AM— the Answer.
Bob is always an honor and privilege to have you join us.
Bob Zadek: Thank you very much, Craig. And by the way, I’m not trying to correct you, but today is a Tuesday not a Wednesday. Because when you’re stuck at home, you lose all track of what day of the week it is. Of course.
Craig Roberts: I got up today thinking, “Well I have to consider my commute to the office.” Then realized, “I don’t think I’m gonna run into any traffic between the bedroom door and the bathroom heading down the hall to the studios.” So it’s a new world to be sure.
Bob Zadek: I thought I’d be late to my high school classes — then I realized, no, I graduated 60 years ago.
Craig Roberts: There you go. Bob I want to talk about where we’re at today, in terms of information overload. Who do you believe? The news has one report, then another news channel has another report. There’s even conflicting information coming out of the so-called COVID-19 team out of Washington DC and the White House.
I wonder about hard — today they said globally 418,000 people affected by COVID-19. 18,000 deaths, 108,000 that have recovered.
Here in the United States: 53,287 infected, 689 deaths, 370 people recovered.
I see that we’re up nearly 10,000 infected from just yesterday and I have to wonder, if the United States government struggles with things like taking the census every 10 years to make sure that we’re not under-counting or over-counting and given how fast all of this is happening, how do we know that a lot of the so-called data out there is isn’t more anecdotal than empirical?
Bob Zadek: Craig, you said we are suffering from information overload. We are not, we are suffering from an incredible shortage of information. We are suffering from misstatement overload, that’s for sure. But we are hungry for information, and getting precious little of it from the usual sources of information we instinctively turn to.
To give just one example every day on the news we hear something like, “The number of new deaths or cases of the virus today has gone up from yesterday.”
Well, that statement is patently false.
We have no idea how many new cases we have. We only know how many newly discovered cases we have. We have no way to learn how many cases there are.
When they leave out the word “discovered” it makes it seem like the number of actual cases is growing. But what is really happening is that we finally have test kits distributed — and as more and more people are tested, we are discovering more cases of the coronavirus that have existed for weeks earlier. So they aren’t necessarily new cases being created. That’s but one example of how we are being misled.
If one wants to really be cynical, you can wonder whether the deception is intentional for various purposes. I’m not going to go there, but I don’t discourage others from at least thinking about it.
I, like everybody else, found myself routinely consuming mainstream media, newspapers, and the evening news, and I found myself getting increasingly agitated. Then I replaced the news with selected bloggers and columnists — smart people who I truly trusted for their brain power and objectivity. I have limited all my information to that selected trusted group and I am calm and relaxed, optimistic, and comfortable in the conclusions and the observations I have made. It has made a profound difference in how I feel about the world and the confidence I have in my own decision making. I invite the audience to try it.
How Media Hijacks Our Emotions to Sell us Advertisements
Craig Roberts: Very solid advice, Bob, because at the end of the day there is so much information — disinformation, incomplete information, and quite frankly, just outright guessing with a whole variety of agendas. Some of this is driven by concerns for the nation’s healthcare. Some of this is driven by concerns over ratings and everything in between. If we’ve learned anything, at the end of the day it’s that they really don’t totally know. Do they?
For example, instead of saying, “We have X number of newly discovered cases,” they just say, “X number of cases.” All of a sudden we begin to test more and more people — just because we’re discovering more cases doesn’t necessarily mean that the Coronavirus is spreading that rapidly, per se, any more than to say, “Well, some people went down to Texas and they drilled for oil and they found more oil — therefore there must be more oil in Texas.” Well, no, that just means that through exploration, we have discovered more oil.
Bob Zadek: We know the mainstream news wants eyeballs and ears. Of course, that’s what they sell to the advertisers. So the fight is to get your attention. Now we all know from our personal relationships, or when we go to the theater, if we enjoy a movie, it’s because the movie got us feeling things, whether it’s fear or happiness or love. You go there to be emotionally stimulated. That’s what draws you. If you feel flat after entertainment, you say “That wasn’t very entertaining.”
Entertainment is equated with evoking an emotion. Therefore the media — indeed, the politicians — can get your attention the best to the extent that they can evoke an emotion. Therefore the coin of the realm, the way that they get your attention, i.e., your vote or your turning to that station, is directly related to how much emotion they can generate. Therefore they go to extreme positions.
I find when I read objective data I don’t feel anything except intellectually competent, which is the most calming feeling in the world. That’s why I urge people for mental health reasons during this time that the way to escape is being informed — but be selective where you get your information from and we can discuss the details.
I pointed out one example just now about leaving out the one word “discovered,” which makes all the difference in the world when talking about whether the extent of the virus is increasing and by how much one word makes all the difference in the world and it doesn’t excite people, it just gives them facts.
Dangerous Talk of Suspending Habeas Corpus
Craig Roberts: I want to pivot to your primary wheelhouse. For folks that are familiar with your program, they know that in addition to being a bestselling author, talk show host, and a lawyer, you’re also a constitutional expert — certainly one of the brightest guys I know when it comes to the Constitution and what it means today.
It was recently made public that the Department of Justice had asked permission to detain people indefinitely — essentially without trial during the course of emergency. I saw that and thought I must have misread something there. The President already has emergency powers that he can draw from during the course of this situation. Why does the Department of Justice suddenly think that it’s necessary to have the power to detain people without the benefit of trial? When you heard about this, Bob, what was your reaction?
Bob Zadek: Enraged and fearful. Fearful, because if we lose the rule of law in our country, we have lost it all. The right to detain people is the right not to be detained except for probable cause. It is deep in our DNA, in our culture, in our legal heritage — going way back to England, to the Magna Carta. The only agency in the United States which is authorized to use force is the government.
We are not ever authorized to use force — it’s usually against the law. Government is the only one who can lawfully coerce or compel you, but they cannot deprive you of your liberty except under very rigid constraints. If they do that, every citizen and non-citizen in the United States has the right to bring what is called the Habeas Corpus proceeding, which is requiring the government to show cause why they are committed to detain you.
The last time and only time Habeas Corpus was ever suspended was when Lincoln did that during the Civil War. Lincoln was not very respectful of the Constitution — in many ways because he felt that it some of the provisions of the Constitution had to be subordinated to Presidential power to preserve the Union.
That debate on whether he was right or not still goes on today. I say that only to show you how important the Founders and our whole jurisprudence places the right to be not deprived of your liberty except on probable cause. So you said, what are they thinking? I have no idea what DOJ is thinking. What they’re thinking is what any government official thinks — how do they expand their power at the expense of the people?
Craig Roberts: What what’s frightening about this request is to essentially put the courts on pause. Now I get the fact, and this has taken place all across the Bay Area, where courts have said, “During the current lockdown we can’t have people gathering, so we’re going to put everything on hold.”
But why would you essentially pause the writ of Habeas Corpus if you’re simply trying to determine whether the government has enough information against you, to detain you in jail until such time as you have your official day in court? Why couldn’t that be done in this day of technology through a video conference if they’re afraid of a potential individual that has been arrested spreading the disease to the judge? Can’t the judge do this in chambers via video and maintain or protect the Constitutional right to habeas Corpus?
Bob Zadek: You asked a very good question. Of course, that assumes that government officials are working as hard as they possibly can to find ways to preserve an individual’s freedom. But in fact, unfortunately many of those — particularly in law enforcement — don’t seem to be motivated to preserve freedom, but rather look upon their role as protecting the public, and to removing any threat however minor, using all of the tools at their disposal.
I can’t speak to a particular public official or act because I’m not familiar with it, but I fear that the motivation to preserve freedom is not as strong as many would like it to be when held by people in power.
Craig Roberts: It seems as if we need to be as vigilant now as back during 9/11, because even then — and we have lingering effects to this day — the government overstepped its constitutional authority under the guise of protecting us and eliminating the increased risk to terrorism. This is the notion that there are some politicians out there that have never seen a crisis that they did not want to somehow take advantage of.
Bob Zadek: You and I have spoken before and I certainly have spoken often on my show about how one of the major tools in the governmental toolbox is to instill fear. If they can make people fearful, they will look for protection and they look for protection often from someone in authority.
Often it’s the church. Many times it’s the government.
We don’t feel that we are competent ourselves, and we need a protector. We need a greater figure than us to protect us. Once the government instills fear — whether it’s fear of drugs or fear of terrorism or fear of disease — then they have a very valuable condition which they can exploit.
Almost all of the onerous compromises of our freedom over the years — from the benign of the institution of withholding taxes for WWII — are temporary measures designed to deal with a temporary problem. Withholding taxes — paying your taxes before you even know you owe money — was done in WWII as a temporary measure. The PATRIOT Act was “temporary” just until we got rid of a few terrorists. They will give you back your rights and privacy — temporary, temporary, temporary — but they never come back.
Craig Roberts: Germaine Greer has a quote that I think nicely sums up the warning that you’re sharing. He says, “Freedom is fragile and must be protected. To sacrifice it, even as a temporary measure, is to betray it.”
Bob Zadek — host of The Bob Zadek Show every Sunday morning, 8: 00 AM on our sister station, 860AM — the Answer.
Bob’s got a new book out too called Secret Sauce: The Founders’ Original Recipe for Limited American Democracy. You’ll find that online at BobZadek.com along with podcast and other information and be sure to tune into his program.
