Thursday, October 1, 2026
These nearly two months of war in Iran have me, and countless others, more on edge than we have ever been. The idea that a conflict in the Middle East could become World War III is very unsettling. When a war is that far away and the parties themselves have a long history of bickering, our lives become unsettled, and we need diversions.
To blot out the talking heads on Fox, MS Now and CNN, I found myself looking for other distractions beyond my work as a government-affairs specialist. I watched some sports events, tuning to NCAA baskeball’s Final Four, hoping to relax. To my surprise, those games could ruin your sleep if you watched every upset. I was rooting for St. John’s, and when the junior point guard Dylan Darling sank a driving, buzzer-beating layup to beat Kansas and send the Red Storm to their first Sweet 16 in 27 years, I almost fell off my chair.
A lot of the other games had surprise endings, and when the final ended with a Michigan victory, I realized that watching the tournament wasn’t the best way to avoid nail-biting. So I turned to other sports, and anything that would distract me from all the news about the Israelis killing Iranian leaders one by one. I got some initial relief watching a women’s pro hockey game between New York Sirens and the Seattle Torrent at Madison Square Garden. It was nice to watch a no-nonsense game that attracted a record crowd of 18,000 .
I also watched the women’s basketball national championship. There were quite a few nervous moments until the final game, when UCLA won its first national title.
Then I decided to do some casual reading, and started with Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy’s new book, titled “How to Test Negative for Stupid, And Why Washington Never Will.” Most of its 224 pages are a lot of fun, thanks to Kennedy’s folksy humor, but the last 30 pages unnerved me, when he lavished praise on the recently ousted attorney general, Pam Bondi.
Rather than move on to a new book, I turned my attention to my streaming television services, Netflix, Amazon and Hulu, in the hope of finding some feel-good movies. When I opened them up, they offered me such calming films as “Supernatural,” “Scream,” “Send Help,” “Sinners” and “The Substance.” I know there are other offerings, but most of the feel-good movies are old and I’ve already seen them.
All my life, I’ve loved good comedy. I cherish the great old names like Jackie Mason, Henny Youngman, Buddy Hackett, Jerry Lewis, Jackie Gleason, George Carlin, Don Rickles and Lenny Bruce. Occasionally I stumble on one of these legends on Facebook, and try to share their comedy with people around me. Regrettably, there are no comedians these days that give me the same belly laughs that I got from those giants. My grandson in Los Angeles heads up a unit of Netflix that promotes a number of comedians, but I haven’t adapted to their new style.
So where do I go for some badly needed diversion? I’m a devout Knicks and Yankees fan, but there’s no way I can get a Knicks playoff ticket without paying big dollars. I love going to Yankees games, too, but their tickets are getting pricier, so I limit my purchases to no more than three games. I enjoy watching major golf tournaments, but sometimes you feel as if the announcers will put you to sleep with their commentary. I am looking forward to the U.S. Open in June, though.
Some of us are lucky to have hobbies that help us escape the pressures of today’s headlines. I love writing and making speeches, but neither lulls you into a peaceful state of mind. Short of moving to Antarctica, where I imagine you can avoid the daily news horrors, I’ll keep trying to find some other relaxing activity. I still watch TV for the weather reports, but goodbye to the other channels.
Jerry Kremer was a state assemblyman for 23 years, and chaired the Assembly’s Ways and Means Committee for 12 years. He currently chairs the Capitol Insight Group, a government relations firm. Comments? jkremer@liherald.com.
