Backtrackin’ On These Few Years

Here is your open thread for April 16-18, 2020. Yeah, three days’ worth, because I’ve been stuck at the Big Box risking my health and that of my family, my community, and our customers, ensuring that everyone in Chester County has access to the essential and “life-sustaining” mulch they can’t live without. (We have 730 confirmed cases here, and 30 deaths, and scarce access to testing, but everybody’s flower beds are gonna look good.)

Aliaume Damala Badara Akon Thiam, aka Akon, turned 47 on April 16. Here’s his gently laid-back hit “Lonely,” which samples a song from Bobby Vinton, who shares the same birthday (Vinton turned 85).

April 16 in the year CE 73 saw the fall of Masada. The Roman Empire has now been dead and gone for more than 1,500 years. The Jewish people are still here.

On April 17, 499 years ago, the trial of Martin Luther began in the Diet of Worms. For the record, Luther’s theology was causing problems because of his Augustinian views, not because of his rabid anti-semitism. The church was cool with that.

On April 18, 115 years ago, the United States Supreme Court embarrassed itself with its decision in Lochner vs. New York, saying that the due process claims of businesses trumped the rights of actual human citizens. This was the work of a bought-and-paid-for court desperately trying to outlaw the reforms of the progressive era — in this specific case, an effort to limit working days to less than 10 hours and work weeks to less than 60.

The Lochner decision was ultimately overturned, and specifically repudiated by later decisions, relegating its argument to the dustbin of history and conceding that, no, the Constitution does not require exploitive wages, child labor, uninspected meat, black lung, or any of the other 19th-century horrors repackaged as “liberty” by the Social Darwinist majority in Lochner. It was only until generations later, with the rise of the Federalist Society and the white evangelical push for its ideology, that any justices looked upon the Lochner decision as anything other than a shameful, corrupt decision and a textbook case of “legislating from the bench.” Today, thanks largely to those white evangelicals, we have a 5-4 majority of justices who are determined to reinstate Lochner and take America back to 1905.

On April 18, 114 years ago, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake shook northern California, starting massive fires that destroyed most of the city and left 3,000 people dead. The death of so many people from a single disaster in one day ranks as the third deadliest such disaster in American history, excluding the past week. By the end of this month, the Great Earthquake likely won’t even be one of America’s ten deadliest days.

Harriet Quimby flew a plane across the English Channel on April 16, 108 years ago. That was almost 10 years after the airplane was invented. It was also Wilbur Wright’s 45th birthday.

On April 16, 1961, Fidel Castro announced that he was a Marxist-Leninist and that Cuba was now a communist country. The United States spent the following 55 years trying to kill the guy. (The Bay of Pigs fiasco took place on April 17, 1961 — the very next day.) Fidel Castro died of old age in 2016.

On April 17, 53 years ago, Katherine Switzer ran the Boston Marathon — finishing the course despite efforts by officials in the men-only race to physically restrain her. “If that girl were my daughter, I would spank her,” the head of the marathon said of Switzer, who was 20 at the time. Women wouldn’t be officially allowed to run in the marathon for another 5 years, because … um, because ….

On April 18, 37 years ago, a suicide bomber struck the US Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 63 people (15 Benghazis). President Ronald Reagan vowed a strong response, and delivered by withdrawing US forces from Lebanon and sending 8,000 American troops to invade the Caribbean island of Grenada.

On April 16, 2007, a heavily armed man killed 32 people and then himself at Virginia Tech. Thirteen years ago, Americans were still so shocked by such mass murders that it seemed like America might do something to prevent them in the future. That has not yet actually happened.

Charlie Chaplin was born April 16, 131 years ago.

Señor Wences was born 126 years ago yesterday. S’alriiight? S’lariiight. Thornton Wilder was born 123 years ago yesterday. I’m more of a Skin of Our Teeth guy than an Our Town guy.

Joy Davidman was born 105 years ago today. William Holden was born 102 years ago yesterday. I’ve seen Sabrina, The Bridge on the River Kwai, and Network several times each and I’d happily watch ’em all again.

Henry Mancini was born 96 years ago. Here’s Audrey Hepburn singing his “Moon River.”

Longtime Illinois Rep. Henry Hyde was born 96 years ago today. Hyde was sued for his “gross negligence” in the S&L scandal of the 1980s due to his corrupt directorship with the Ponzi-like Clyde Federal S&L. He defended perjury in the Iran-Contra hearings, arguing it was in defense of selling arms to terrorists in order to fund other terrorists, and therefore for a good cause. And he explained that his long extramarital affair with a married mother of three was, unlike Bill Clinton’s infidelity, excusable because he was only a youthful 41 at the time and because he dumped his girlfriend after she divorced her husband. All of this led to Hyde’s name being synonymous with the moral superiority of white evangelicals, who take great pride in being “Pro-Hyde.”

Dusty Springfield would have turned 81 on April 16. Here’s “Son of a Preacher Man.”

Professional wrestler Rowdy Roddy Piper would have turned 66 yesterday. They Live is an all-time classic.

Six-time NBA champion, hall-of-famer, and all-around mensch Kareem Abdul-Jabbar turned 73 on April 16. Peter Garrett, who is not quite as tall as Kareem, but almost as cool, turned 67. Here’s “Sometimes.” Sometimes I just need to hear “Sometimes.”

Rick Moranis turns 67 today. Ellen Barkin turned 66 on April 16. Susan Faludi turns 61 today. Sean Bean turned 61 yesterday. Bean died in 1986, 1989, 1990 (twice), 1992, 1994, 1995, 1998, 2000, 2001 (twice), 2002, 2003, 2005, 2007 (twice), 2009, 2010 (twice), and 2012. He currently lives in Yorkshire.

Dave Pirner turned 56 on April 16. Here’s “Runaway Train.” It’s an incoherent string of clichés, but it’s catchy. Conan O’Brien turns 56 today.

Jon Cryer and Martin Lawrence were born the same day, both turned 55 on April 16.

Liz Phair turned 53 yesterday. Here’s “F–k and Run.”

David Tennant turns 49 today. Jennifer Garner turned 48 yesterday.