AMC Theaters versus Universal Films

AMC Theaters

AMC Theaters just announced they will no longer showcase Universal Film movies. Why are they doing it? Because Universal released Trolls World Tour directly to home viewers rather than offering it to theater chains first. Universal did this largely in response to the fact most theaters are closed because of the Covid-19 situation.

The stated problem for AMC Theaters and their CEO and President Adam Aron is simply the release of the movie in a way that bypasses the theaters. There is some truth in this but I suspect the bigger reason for the decision is that this particular release generated over $100 million in revenue. A number that is similar to the projected take for a widescreen release. This is a frightening confirmation of something the movie theater owners and operators have long feared, the end of their revenue stream.

More and more people watch their media at home and on their devices. This is undeniable. Hollywood revenue has remained relatively stable for the last eleven years after having nearly doubled in the same period prior to 2009.

Universal released Trolls World Tour directly to viewers and this is not particular strange. Plenty of content providers are doing the same but not for what are considered Blockbuster Movies. For companies like AMC Theaters the blockbuster has become the heart of their revenue stream. Independent movies continue to thrive but generate far less revenue than blockbusters. Meanwhile, streaming services like Netflix, HBO, and Amazon are taking a bigger and bigger bite out of their potential content.

AMC Theaters wants to stay in business. Universal Films wants to make as much money as possible and those two desires are now in conflict. Thus, the strongly worded letter from AMC Theaters. That letter, quite amusing if you read the whole thing, has this little gem within: Incidentally, this policy is not aimed solely at Universal out of pique or to be punitive in any way…. I chuckle. It is absolutely done out of pique and is punitive in nature. That boldfaced fib alone is enough to make me take Universal Film’s side in this issue.

AMC Theaters has legitimate concerns and they are desperately attempting to slow the movement of media consumption away from theaters and onto devices. Perhaps they will succeed. Maybe Universal, and other content providers, will ignore the fact they made as much from a non-theatrical release as they would have from putting the blockbuster in theaters.

Of course, if AMC Theaters goes through with this plan, they are also eliminating a major studio from their theaters and thus a large stream of revenue.

Personally, I think the steady decline of people viewing movies at the theater will continue and AMC Theaters will eventually go the way of Blockbuster Movie Rentals. Perhaps I’m wrong. Time will tell. What do you think?

Is AMC going to succeed in their threat to pull all Univeral Films?

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Tom Liberman

The Unwanted Shake Shack Government Loan

Shake Shack Government Loan

What does it tell you a Shake Shack Government Loan was returned? For a lot of people, it’s a gesture of goodwill by Shake Shack to the other small businesses that need the money more. That’s not the way this anti-government Libertarian sees it. The Shake Shack Government Loan was simply a way to make the company obligated to the government, the owners didn’t seek it, didn’t want it, didn’t ask for it, but got it anyway. Forcing them to return it.

I’m proud to say the Shake Shack founder is St. Louis hometown hero Danny Meyer. Yet another illustrious graduate of John Burroughs, a fine school my lack of academic prowess disqualified me from attending. That is not the point of today’s article.

Why would anyone get a loan they didn’t want or need? That’s a question you must ask yourself. Why would any entity be given a check they didn’t ask to receive? One of the main reasons is the United States Government is big on giving out loans, our entire financial system is largely based on giving out taxpayer money as loans, this money generally having to be repaid with interest that goes to friends of politicians.

The government is certainly using Covid-19 as an excuse to further entangle the interests of its patrons into every aspect of citizens life. This unwanted intrusion didn’t start with Covid-19. President Trump created a Welfarm State with ridiculous tariffs, the Post Office was intentionally bankrupted, the Airline Industry has been a government subsidy since its inception and resulted in the planned destruction of the highly successful passenger rail system, the entire horse meat industry was destroyed. This is how government operates in a Republic.

In a Republic there are limits to what government officials can do. There are Checks and Balances. This being the case, government officials must wile their insidious evil in different ways. One of the ways they do this is to make people and businesses their unwitting partners. The government is happy to loan you money, purchase your products at inflated prices, because they then become a partner in your enterprise. You owe them.

The Shake Shack government loan is just another in a long line of takeover attempts that have reduced the United States to a system of Crony Capitalism. At least Shake Shack saw through the subterfuge although many others do not.

We no longer have a capitalistic system here in the United States and I suspect we won’t have a Republic for much longer either.

Tom Liberman

The Daly Vodka Cure Misleading Headline

Daly Vodka Cure

Is the Daly Vodka Cure really what golfer Jon Daly was suggesting in his recent video? It’s an interesting Misleading Headline because Daly pretty much did say that his one drink a day, an entire bottle of Belvedere vodka, was the way to kill Covid-19. However, I don’t think he is really suggesting the Daly Vodka cure as a serious panacea.

If you watch the short video, he advises people to be careful and to be safe and appears, at least to me, to be joking about his Vodka Cure. Here is where it gets fairly interesting for me besides the simple Misleading Headline. I do think Daly is kidding and I think the vast majority of people will agree with me. However, I well-understand people will believe pretty much anything, regardless of how ludicrous, as long as it aligns with what they want to believe.

It’s entirely possible that thousands of people will take the Daly Vodka cure seriously. They will begin to drink a bottle of vodka, washed down with a McDonal’s diet Coke apparently, as a way to ward off the illness. I’m frankly surprised that Daly didn’t suggest his two-pack a day cigarette habit isn’t actually the miracle that warded off Covid-19 but that’s not really the point today.

Daly is a self-destructive person and his habits have wrecked his health and curtailed what was once a promising golf career. People like Daly and in many ways, he is a likeable personality. They find him humorous and entertaining. They see his life and think, why not. It’s not so bad, sure, I’ll likely die young from cancer or cirrhosis of the liver but what the heck, have fun now. And, they are right. That is to say they are right for them. Not for me.

I love life and want more of it. I don’t want to curtail my ability to go hiking, meet fit women at the gym, go out with friends, and enjoy the occasional cocktail. Daly is not of that opinion and I’m sure he is not alone. That’s none of my business. If you think drinking an entire bottle of vodka is a good idea for you, have at it. If you think it’s going to cure your case of Covid-19 when all evidence suggests heavy drinking makes you more susceptible to the disease, again, that’s your decision to make.

I’ll even turn a blind eye, although my favorite mixologist over at Sub-Zero might see it differently, to the horror of blending Belvedere Vodka with Diet Coke, though doing so offends my sensibilities greatly.

Do remember one thing, in addition to the Daly Vodka cure, Daly suggests staying safe and taking care. If you want to destroy your own life, have at it, but if you’re going to risk getting Covid-19 through risky behavior, do the rest of us the favor of staying away.

Tom Liberman

Lori Loughlin is the Covid-19 Response from the United States

Lori Loughlin

Do you want to be Lori Loughlin and fight for a long time or Felicity Huffman and take your punishment up front and move on? Sometimes in life you have a choice between suffering today or delaying the pain until later in the hopes of avoiding it altogether. It’s an interesting decision from a Game Theory perspective and I like to examine it today.

In the case of Covid-19, the United States trod the Lori Loughlin path of delaying the pain in the hopes it would go away. It didn’t and now we’re paying the price. Meanwhile countries like Japan and South Korea went the Felicity Huffman rout and took the punishment early, avoiding more disastrous consequences later.

Is one choice better than the other? If you choose to avoid punishment today there is always the chance the pain will never come. Perhaps Lori Loughlin will have the charges against her dismissed or she will not face any prison time. Felicity Huffman, on the other hand, pled guilty and served a few weeks in a minimum-security prison. She has that on her record forever but she is basically living her best life now and has been for a while.

There are arguments both ways. It’s sort of like staying in place when a hurricane is forecast for your region. If you don’t leave and the disaster doesn’t come, you’ve saved a lot of time and effort. However, if it does come, you might well die, be horribly injured, lose family members, or otherwise suffer for a long period of time.

In this case, President Trump and many of his political allies decided Covid-19 wasn’t that big a risk. That it probably wouldn’t get bad and we shouldn’t risk economic pain today for the uncertain forecasts of its dire consequences tomorrow. Some of them maintain that position even today despite the dying going on all over the country.

To be honest, we still face that very same decision right now. We are currently avoiding public gatherings but people are still getting sick and dying. The question we cannot answer is how many might have died; how bad would the economic impact be if the disease spread more quickly and widely throughout the United States? How bad might it get if we give up on social distancing too early?

It’s not unreasonable to conclude that had people continued to congregate normally the eventual economic impact could have been far worse. If huge numbers of people got sick then everyone would isolate without prompting from the government, merely out of self-preservation. This would hurt the economy far worse than we are currently experiencing.

Of course, it might not have been that bad. That’s the risk you take when you decide to avoid pain today in hopes it won’t arrive, and be significantly worse, tomorrow. It’s the decision you face right now in regards to social distancing. Accept the suffering today? Put it off and hope it won’t be so bad tomorrow?

Perhaps Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman might give us cogent answers to these questions. As for me, I think it’s better to take the consequences today rather than suffer later, you may disagree.

Tom Liberman

Should Christians Welcome Death?

Christians Welcome Death

The questions of should Christians Welcome Death is an interesting one and in the news of late because Reverend Tony Spell said exactly that in encouraging his religious followers to attend church amid the Covid-19 Pandemic. It’s important to understand that Spell is absolutely correct with his Christians welcome death sentiment. What, what, what?

There’s no denying it. The bible is clear what awaits Christians after their death and who would not want that? The question is the essence of Pascal’s Wager which I argued against in a previous blog. Those of you who argue for Pascal’s Wager must also agree that Christians welcome death.

Now, you might ask, why not just encourage Christians to commit suicide? Believe it or not, that’s exactly what Christians were doing before Saint Augustine decided to interpret, Thou Shall Not Kill to mean Thou Shall not Kill Thyself. I won’t go into his logic on the subject, let us just accept church doctrine.

What Spell is saying is that going to heaven, essentially dying, is a good thing in the mind of any true believer and I find no flaw in his logic. If that’s the case but Christians must also not commit suicide, we have a fairly clear path. Engage in behavior that is life-threatening as often as possible. A clear way to do this, particularly if you are elderly or health compromised, is to put yourself in a position to get a disease that might well kill you. Gather at churches to pray and if you get Covid-19, if you get sick, if you die, more the better.

Naturally, you are risking the lives of those around you as well, but that’s not a big deal because it’s all god’s will anyway. If he wants me to contract Covid-19 from you and then pass it along to my elderly mother, causing her death, that’s all good anyway, even though she doesn’t believe in your god.

If you believe that the bible is the word of god; you believe that adulterers should be stoned, rapists must be punished by being forced to marry their victim and pay the father, and that Christians welcome death.

To be clear, I don’t welcome death. I love life. I want more living. More pretty girls. More time at the gym. More time with my friends. More whiskey. More good food. More laughs. More, my friends, give me more! Then again, I’m not a Christian and I never will be.

Tom Liberman

Being a Good Christian

Good Christian

What do I see as Good Christian behavior? Selfish, angry, violent, intolerant, murderous, money-worshipping, self-righteous, arrogant, bereft of personal responsibility. These are the words the immediately leap to my mind. Now, I’m an Atheist so feel free to look at your disgusting religion through rose-colored glasses and ignore me. I’m telling you what I see.

I recognize there are many people, some my friends, who claim the Christian faith and are not these things, but those who think of themselves this way are the outliers. I’ve had many conversations with Christians who don’t agree with mainstream doctrine in regards to transgenders, Muslims, homosexuals, atheist, Democrats; yet you support the leaders that make statements against these people. Good Christians are you, and I see your vile behavior every day in media outlets of all kinds.

That’s not me, you say, I’m a good person. Yet, you sat in your churches day after day listening to the hatred and did nothing. It’s not that you are losing your religion, it’s lost. You sat in silence while it descended into hate fueled, fact ignoring, cruelty and outright evil. You did nothing and now it’s gone. So, don’t tell me you’re a decent human being, you are part and parcel of it all, don’t fool yourself.

Now you try and post kind, helpful things on your Social Media outlets in an effort to pretend you are not part of the disgusting, murderous, cult that, on those infrequent occasions you actually consult your morality, sickens your stomach. You are the problem; you are a Good Christian.

Good Christians are willing to sacrifice anyone who disagrees with their doctrine, they do not care, they do not help, they are invested in hurting anyone and everyone who they see as a threat. Good Christians fund this hate-machine that spews its bile on everything decent and kind.

A Good Christian really isn’t about religion anymore. They are a social movement, a political movement, a monolithic assault on freedom, which is a subject I take quite seriously.

Don’t fool yourself, you are a Good Christian and that’s not anything to brag about.

Tom Liberman

The Inherent Corruption of an Essential Business

Essential Business

What is an essential business? Covid-19 is forcing state and local governments across the United States to make this determination and the methodology being used once again gives me an opportunity to go on a Libertarian Rant.

Being designated an essential business means you continue to collect revenue when others cannot. This is an enormous incentive for owners to get the government to declare them an essential business. The idea is simple enough, what business must stay open in order for people to survive? Yet, the implementation, when handed to people who are susceptible to bribery, influence, and even threats becomes something entirely different.

In the world we live in, an essential business is simply one where the owners have enough influence with government officials to be declared such. I’m not picking on one business or another, frankly, they probably should be bribing and threatening local politicians to stay open as it means they continue their revenue stream when everyone else cannot.

The point is that essential is largely meaningless when government gets to define it. If we got together and talked about it or five minutes we’d come up with a pretty definitive list. Food and water, medical supplies and service, and HVAC depending on the season. As an aside, the preceding sentence demonstrates the necessity of the Oxford Comma.

Once government becomes involved, it’s all essential if you pay those making the decisions enough. All you have to do is have a friend in government and your business gains an enormous competitive advantage. Your employees can be forced to come into work and do their jobs. Now, for many employees this is a good thing although certainly some would prefer not to risk their lives doing so, that’s not really the point.

The reality of anything being an essential business at this time of Covid-19 illustrates the problem with having government make these decisions for us. If you run a business type that doesn’t have influence, you don’t get to decide for yourself if you should be open, the government makes that decision for you.

I’m not saying staying open is necessarily a good thing, if a bunch of your employees and customers get Covid-19 and die that’s horrific. I’m just saying when government decides what is an essential business rather than consumers, we get clearly non-essential businesses staying open. That’s the problem with having government make decisions for us. They force bad decisions on us. We should be free to make those bad decisions ourselves.

Tom Liberman