Springtime Cabin Fever Music

A 70’s collection of songs about avoiding crowds, either by choice… or not. I played all of these, except for ‘Isolation’, during my AM radio DJ days on an Adult Contemporary station.

Eric Carmen’s ‘All By Myself’ is based upon Rachmaninoff’s Concerto for Piano #2, featured 30 years earlier in the superb David Lean film, Brief Encounter. Written by Noel Coward, this deftly nuanced, devastating study of two married, middle-aged people who fall crashingly in love is the finest example of a truly adult film in the best sense of the term. Celia Johnson is beyond wonderful in this role.

Recycled Space

I’ve talked about Byron Haskin here before. Haskin had quite the varied and interesting career in Hollywood. He is perhaps best known for directing The War of the Worlds in 1953, which is one of my favorite movies.

Ann Robinson and Gene Barry in ‘The War of the Worlds’

Here I am with Ann Robinson last November. Ann is a delight to meet with and chat, and I couldn’t resist buying that model of the Martian war machine.

Haskin had a knack for coming up with quick and economical special effects. He had worked with director Frank Capra on Arsenic and Old Lace, and it’s my suspicion that he produced the outer space effect at the opening to It’s a Wonderful Life. I say that because the footage was recycled by Haskin in S1:E29 of The Outer Limits.

The Other Inflation

Thanks to the effects of the virus on the economy, here at last is an all-too-brief discussion about the Federal Reserve’s role in propping up Wall Street, at the expense of the real economy.

As I have said before, the stock market has been over-inflated for years, due to interest rates being held artificially low. With no money to be made in safely insured accounts, such as Certificates of Deposit, it went to equity investments, helping to inflate the market. The Federal Reserve should have been raising rates a long time ago, but didn’t thanks to the core rate of consumer inflation being very low, while income inequality continued to grow. As always, investment bankers became addicted to the bull market, and refused to see the weak ground it was running on.

The last hike in interest rates should have been left in place. The fact that the Fed lowered rates last year was proof that Jay Powell was, at best, using outdated thinking and, at worst, responding to pressure from Trump. Powell needs to see that we can’t return to business as usual, and he must lead the Fed into taking on the role of fighting inflation on Wall Street. It won’t be easy, because if there is a lessening of income inequality — which will require a more progressive tax policy — there is the risk of returning to the days of consumer inflation.