It's Brian Lehrer, and this is my daily politics podcast from WNYC Studios.

It's Friday, May 8th.

You know, things change dramatically and things remain the same in the coronavirus year.

Things are changing when more than 20 million Americans last month lost their jobs.

That's the new government stat.

More than 20 million Americans lost their jobs in April.

The previous one-month record was 2 million, and that was in 1945.

Things are changing when, as the world waits for a new vaccine, parts of Africa have suspended

use of an old one for polio as part of coronavirus emergency response.

Things are changing when the value of Iran's currency has plummeted so much with the crashing oil prices,

since people aren't flying or driving, plus from U.S. sanctions, that the government there has

decided to lop off three zeros from the way the currency is numbered. I guess if we were paying

$20,000 for a pizza instead of $20, we might lop off three zeros too.

Things are changing when countries have to choose among degrees of locking down their economies.

Spain and Wuhan, intense, the United States, middling and conflicted.

Sweden, less than any affected country. How's that working

out? We'll take a look in a minute. But some things remain the same. Brooklyn prosecutors say

of the 40 people arrested for social distancing violations in the borough, 35 of those 40 have been

black.

And because another unarmed black man was shot to death in Georgia by a couple of white guys,

they've even been charged with murder in this case, and despite the video of it played

over and over again on cable news, and we know who watches cable news all day, the President

...