Dopesick

Sam Smith - A couple of days after I finished writing a piece about how America was being run by two major subcultures - a destructive dominant one and a dysfunctional decent one - I started watching Dopesick on Hulu and soon realized I was seeing a modified version of the division I had outlined - symbolized by an OxyContin salesman who described himself as addicted to money and a well meaning doctor led to overdose his patients and himself. 

This is not only an excellent description of the drug scandal that Purdue Pharma led us into, but a fine metaphor of how the striving for power by a few can victimize the many, or in other words, how Trump et al have overdosed us.

Here's from a description of the series from NPR:

Dopesick is an ambitious, emotional series tackling a sprawling story. It outlines the start of the OxyContin opioid addiction crisis from several angles: doctors and patients using the drug, prosecutors and law enforcement trying to hold OxyContin manufacturer Purdue Pharma accountable, and the drugmaker itself.

Character actor extraordinaire Michael Stuhlbarg plays Purdue Pharma's onetime president Richard Sackler with the creepy intensity of a Bond villain. Disrespected by his relatives and driven to outdo the accomplishments of his uncle Arthur Sackler — who pioneered the marketing strategy for Valium -- Stuhlbarg's Richard Sackler pushes the family-owned company to heavily market OxyContin.

As his character explains, OxyContin has a protective coating that time-releases the drug, allowing the company to claim that less than 1% of patients would become addicted to the opioid. Some of Dopesick's most powerful scenes show how Sackler's contentions become marching orders for an army of salespeople intent on getting doctors to prescribe OxyContin instead of competing painkillers — producing a level of profit that would make the Sacklers one of America's richest families.