Not Your Last Christmas

[A cartoon by Adam Douglas Thompson (The New Yorker via Twitter)]

In the U.S., the holidays can be a profoundly disorienting time, perhaps because so many converges during a few short weeks. Our roles as family members, consumers and religious adherents all get tested starting with Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Hanukkah, Christmas, and a few others all stacked at year's end, not to mention the impending launch of a new year.

Furthermore, in this year of the plague, every emotion feels heightened by the isolation and the strangeness surrounding us.

For me, New Year's is the holiday that evokes the most intense feelings, as I strive to review the past year, wipe the slate clean, and embark on the next one.

If we are all acting in our own movies, as I suspect we are, the three acts of 2020 have pretty much exhausted themselves and we are limping toward the climax. But what will that be?

Just think about the political reality of this moment. Some two-thirds of the electorate turned out to vote in the presidential election. They were mainly energized by the incumbent, whether you're for him or against him. He is without debate one of the major populist figures in American history, deeply divisive in ways that go well beyond any ideological differences that may exist.

In some ways, he represents the countryside, sparsely populated, under-educated, poor, religious and mainly white against the cities, which are massive, diverse, rich, agnostic and where the doctrines and story lines of our movies (good and evil) are controlled and distributed. 

And whether Trump himself chooses to run for president again in the future or not, his outsized influence over the countryside will persist. We have in no way seen the last of his brand of populism.

So much for the political leitmotif in our movie. Consider the economic. The yawning divide between the haves and the have-nots is rapidly mutating into the "have-too-much" segment (small) and the "feel-left-out" segment (large).

This fault line splits the cities internally every bit as much as the country as a whole. Mansions sit next to slums and nowhere is that more evident than here in the Bay Area.

Silicon Valley billionaires own fabulous homes with security guards while the homeless encampments in neighborhoods like West Oakland rival anything you'll see in a Third World country. Block after block of tents and rusting RVs line the streets, punctuated by endless blocks of dumping grounds with piles of trash so huge that they rival the Indian burial mounds that are located nearby. 

The yawning political and economic divides are splitting along generational lines too, as I've argued, with the highest burden falling on younger Millennials and Get-Z. Please just listen to Great Thunberg!

Everything converges around the existential threat of climate change. As the virus bedeviling us mutates and sheds itself even before we feel its symptoms and can seek treatment, we continue to evolve biologically much too slowly to compete with it. We'll be forced, IMHO, to utilize genetic engineering for the species to survive going forward, with forcible mutations that allow us to adapt more quickly to a radically changing earth.

The coming hierarchy will be defined by who makes those decisions and which human traits endure, as the others are discarded much like that trash on the streets of West Oakland.

Because of all of these factors, we may be the last generation of traditional humans, shaped by geologically determined forces, and viscerally by our choices through sexual attraction and reproduction.

Each pandemic weakens our collective immune system so much that the dystopian nightmare I I describe is most certainly the only way our descendants will survive. 

That's a heavy load to carry from 2020 onward.

How do we cope? In the little ways. We can't change our fate. Make a drawing for a friend, find a book for someone, make that phone call you've been hesitating to make, tell that story, sit out in the sun or squeeze your nose to the window in a snowstorm, sing a Christmas carol, even off-tune, pray, hug those you live with, breathe the air free of smoke, listen to some favorite music, bake Christmas cookies for a neighbor, by all means say "I love you" and consider the myths that have come down through the ages.

Most critical of all, connect! Do not decouple from humanity. Don't drink to excess. Isolation is only a state of mind when you when you decide to fight it. Don't let it win. Yes the storm clouds are dark but maybe, just maybe there yet will be a silver lining.

***

And add to your list of Christmas movies if you've not seen it (or even if you have) "Silver Linings Playbook" with Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper. Robert De Niro plays a supporting role.

The film takes head on modern family life, mental illness, improbable connections and romantic love. Since it is Hollywood, there has to be a silver lining. The final scenes with the incomparable Jennifer Lawrence, scored, lit and angled to perfection, preach that hope, indeed, still can conquer our loneliness.

The news marches on, there's hope there too if you look for it...

* Biden Picks Deb Haaland to Lead Interior Department -- The historic choice would elevate a Native American to a cabinet secretary position for the first time, and do so at an agency that played a central role in the nation’s long-running abuse of native peoples. 

* With historic picks at interior and EPA, Biden puts environmental justice front and center (WashPo)

* California, now the U.S. pandemic epicenter, is nearing zero capacity in its intensive care units as COVID-19 cases continue to surge. As of yesterday, there was just 3% ICU capacity statewide. Southern California was completely full. [HuffPost]

* More Hacking Attacks Found as Officials Warn of ‘Grave Risk’ to U.S. Government (Trump has been silent on the hacking). (NYT)

* The nation’s cybersecurity agency warned of a “grave” risk to government and private networks from an intrusion carried out by suspected Russian hackers. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said that the intrusion had compromised federal agencies as well as “critical infrastructure” in a sophisticated attack that was hard to detect and will be difficult to undo. Sen. Mitt Romney said that it is "extraordinary" that President Donald Trump has said nothing about the attack. [AP]

* Cyber technology shares soar as security attacks pile up (Reuters)

*Suspected Russian hackers accessed the systems of a U.S. internet provider and a county government in Arizona as part of a sprawling cyber-espionage campaign disclosed this week, web records show. (Reuters)

* Earlier this week, a photo of Georgia GOP Sen. Kelly Loeffler posing alongside Chester Doles, a former Ku Klux Klan leader and member of the neo-Nazi National Alliance who went to prison in the 1990s for assaulting a Black man, went viral. Her campaign disavowed it. But HuffPost has been sent another photo of Loeffler posing with Joshua Mote, Lumpkin County coordinator for a Georgia extremist group led by Doles. And in August, Loeffler sat down for an interview with Jack Posobiec, a neo-Nazi collaborator and prominent MAGA propagandist. [HuffPost]

* The nation’s political divisions are rooted in geographic divisions, a trend that is clearly revealed by the changing party control of seats in the House of Representatives. (WSJ)

* Washington Monument closed over concerns Cabinet secretary’s private tour exposed staff to coronavirus (WashPo)

* Trump has invoked the Georgia Senate runoffs many times over the past month raising money for his $100 million-plus “leadership” political committee — but has not reported spending a dime on those races. “It would suggest that the PAC is blatantly lying to its supporters to raise money that President Trump could use for his own personal benefit,” said Robert Maguire, a campaign finance expert. [HuffPost]

* As Singapore Ventures Back Out, Migrant Workers Are Kept In -- The low-wage workers, almost half of whom have contracted the coronavirus, continue to be mostly confined to dormitories even as the city-state eases restrictions (NYT)

* South Africa identifies new coronavirus strain causing surge in cases (Reuters)

* COVID-19 Is Now Leading Killer In 5 Latin American Nations (NPR)

* Night trains halted for New Year's Eve in Tokyo (NHK)

* Iran has begun construction on a site at its underground nuclear facility at Fordo amid tensions with the U.S. over its atomic program, according to satellite photos obtained by The Associated Press on Friday. (AP)

* An Agonizing Wait After Nigeria Abductions, Then a Flood of Relief -- The seizure of more than 300 boys brought immediate comparisons to the 2014 kidnapping of hundreds of schoolgirls. But an anguishing six days later, a state governor said the boys had been released. (NYT)

* A judge in San Diego ruled that two strip clubs could remain open, a decision that extends to restaurants and will allow them to reopen to some extent. [The San Diego Union-Tribune]

* Falling Behind on Weekly Rent and Afraid of Being Evicted -- Residents of weekly rentals worry they will be kicked out if they can’t pay the rent. It’s unclear if the federal moratorium on evictions applies to them. (NYT)

* Lake Tahoe is cracking down on short-term rentals, but officials can’t stop visitors from coming. [SFGATE]  

* College students recruited as teachers to keep schools open (AP)

* “Cyberpunk 2077” is no longer available on the PlayStation Store, while the gaming-console’s parent Sony Corp. , along with Xbox maker Microsoft Corp. , is offering refunds to customers who bought the videogame on their platforms. (WSJ)

* Massive iceberg pivots, breaks near south Atlantic penguin colony island -- Strong currents have taken hold of a massive Antarctic iceberg that is on a collision course towards South Georgia Island, causing it to shift direction and lose a major chunk of mass, a scientist tracking its journey said on Friday. (Reuters)
* Potentially Promising Covid-19 Vaccine Hits Roadblock After Testing Reveals It’s Just Shotgun (The Onion)***

You were mine for just a while
Now your putting on the style
And you never once looked back
To your home across the track
You're the gossip of the town
But my heart can still be found 
Where you tossed it on the ground
Pick me up on your way down

Pick me up on your way down
When your blue and all alone
When their glamor starts to bore you
Come back where you belong 
When you learn these things are true
I'll be waiting here for you
When you tumble to the ground
Pick me up on your way down

They have changed your attitude
Made you haughty and so rude
Your new friends can take the blame
Underneath you're still the same
You may be their pride and joy 
But they'll find another toy
When your new love can't be found
Pick me up on your way down

-- Songwriter: Harlan Howard

-30-

The Ghost of Anna Mae Aquash

When I first visited Pine Ridge Reservation, site of the Wounded Knee massacre, in 1976, it left an indelible impression on me. It is an eerily beautiful place of wind-swept plains that seems haunted by the voices of the dead echoing from the foothills of the Black Hills in the distance.

Home to the Lakota (Sioux) people, Pine Ridge was central in the 1970s to a concerted effort by Native Americans to demand their rights and reclaim their land from the occupying U.S. government.

The American Indian Movement (AIM) emerged as the leading voice of the activists in that uprising. The occasion for my visit to Pine Ridge was the mysterious murder of AIM activist Anna Mae Aquash, a 30-year-old mother of two and member of the Mi'kmaq tribe who traveled from Nova Scotia to join the rebellion.

Aquash was an articulate feminist who organized demonstrations and spoke out eloquently on behalf of native rights. She also was AIM co-founder Dennis Banks' lover at a time when AIM had been placed under FBI surveillance by President Nixon.

“These white people think this country belongs to them,” Aquash wrote in a letter to her sister at the time. “The whole country changed with only a handful of raggedy-ass pilgrims that came over here in the 1500s. And it can take a handful of raggedy-ass Indians to do the same, and I intend to be one of those raggedy-ass Indians.”

Violence haunted AIM and by 1975, more than 60 Indians had been mysteriously killed. Activists accused the U.S. government of waging a deadly war against their people. Tensions between AIM and the FBI on Pine Ridge reached a boiling point. In an armed battle with AIM members, two FBI agents were killed. 

Afterward, authorities grilled Aquash about the killings and then released her, leading her AIM colleagues to suspect she might be an informer. 

Five months later, she disappeared.

In February 1976, her badly decomposed body was discovered by a rancher working his property line; she had been killed execution-style by a single shot to the head.

For Rolling Stone, Lowell Bergman and I traveled to Pine Ridge to try and find out who was behind her murder.With investigative stories of this kind, sometimes you solve the mystery and sometimes you don't.

In Anna Mae's case, we discovered a lot of salient details but we did not solve the mystery. In that sense you could say we failed. But we did write a long story about the case, which perhaps helped raise awareness. 

Over the years, the mystery bubbled to the surface from time to time until finally (in 2004 and 2010) authorities were able to convict two low-level AIM members in her killing.

According to a piece in the New York Times Magazine by Eric Konigsberg, these two were essentially the fall guys for the crime, which was engineered by a group of AIM women known as the Pie Patrol.

Almost certainly, according to Konigsberg, higher-ups ordered the Pie Patrol to have Anna Mae murdered. If so, the guilty parties apparently went to their graves with their secret. Dennis Banks died three years ago at age 80, leaving 20 children behind. 

According to Lakota legend, when the body of a murder victim is moved, a strong wind will blow.When you stand out on Pine Ridge today, you can feel that wind and hear the voices of ghosts echoing around you. 

One of those is Anna Mae Aquash.

(Thanks to Ann Donaldson.)

***

The news:

* Microsoft has identified more than 40 of its customers around the world that had problematic versions of a third-party IT management program installed and that were specifically targeted by the suspected Russian hacking campaign disclosed this week, the company said in a blog post Thursday.The tech company said that 80% of those victims are in the US while the rest are in seven other countries: Canada, Mexico, Belgium, Spain, the United Kingdom, Israel and the United Arab Emirates. (CNN)

* New infections in California surge 50 percent in a day, making it the U.S epicenter (WashPo)

* People Thought Covid-19 Was Relatively Harmless for Younger Adults. They Were Wrong. -- New research shows that July may have been the deadliest month for young adults in modern American history. (NYT)

* If Biden halts border wall project, U.S. would save $2.6 billion, Pentagon estimates show (WashPo)

* Winter storm dropped more snow in parts of the Northeast than all of last year's winter season (CNN)

* 'Losing A Generation': Fall College Enrollment Plummets For 1st-Year Students -- Researchers say the pandemic is largely to blame for this year's drastic enrollment declines, but college-going has also been on a decade-long downward trend. (NPR)

* As the coronavirus ravaged New York this spring, state officials faced a terrifying prospect: Casualties were mounting, and the reserve of ventilators and masks was dwindling. As doctors considered rationing lifesaving treatment, the state rushed into $1.1 billion in deals for supplies and equipment. Now, New York wants much of that money back. (NYT)

* On Jan. 6, Vice President Mike Pence will oversee final confirmation of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory. Then he'll likely head overseas. (Politico)

* Joint Chiefs Head Meets With Taliban in Afghanistan (AP)

* Walgreens and CVS staff will soon begin vaccinations at tens of thousands of long-term care facilities. Some staff and residents are wary, and there are thorny issues of consent. (NYT)

* President-elect Joe Biden is expected to get his first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine as soon as next week, just days after thousands of Americans and frontline workers began receiving the shots. Biden will get his vaccination in a public setting in an effort to encourage eligible Americans to get vaccinated and to instill trust in the treatments. [HuffPost]

* E-Commerce to Total a Quarter of Global Retail by 2024, GroupM Forecasts (WSJ)

* As Mexico’s security deteriorates, the power of the military grows (WashPo)

* California lost more people to Covid-19 in the past year than became new residents. (NYT)

* When the history of the pandemic is written, one of the great mysteries will be what President Donald Trump was doing in the waning days of his presidency as the number of Covid-19 deaths in the U.S. soared past 3,000 each day, the virus spread unchecked and Congress dithered over the details of an emergency relief package that could be the difference between people being able to eat and being forced to sleep on the streets this holiday season.Trump ran for president pretending he was the consummate dealmaker, the chief executive who could make things happen with a snap of his fingers. He will go down in history as a president who worsened the grief and tragedy of the most consequential pandemic in 100 years by being contemptuous of masks and the safety precautions designed by his own administration -- a man incapable of empathy, who chose to remain cocooned in his White House bubble at a time when leadership would have mattered. (CNN)

***

All the gold in California
Is in a bank in the middle of Beverly Hills
In somebody else's name
So if you're dreamin' about California
It don't matter at all where you've played before
California's a brand-new game

Tryin' to be a hero, winding up a zero
Can scar a man forever right down to your soul
Living on the spotlight can kill a man outright
'Cause everything that glitters is not gold

And all the gold in California
Is in a bank in the middle of Beverly Hills
In somebody else's name
So if you're dreamin' about California
It don't matter at all where you've played before
California's a brand-new game

All the gold in California
Is in a bank in the middle of Beverly Hills
In somebody else's name
So if you're dreamin' about California
It don't matter at all where you've played before
California's a brand-new game
A brand-new game

Songwriter: Larry Gatlin

-30-

For This Christmas

 This book, by my daughter Sarah Tiglao, captures the sadness, beauty and resilience of the Christmas spirit during the pandemic. Pleas consider buying it for your grandchildren.

-30-

In Our Dreams

 

Every night I wake up at 1, 2, or 3 a.m. and can't go back to sleep until I've had something to eat, edited my nightly essay, and published here at Facebook.

It has become an established routine that I am reluctant to mess with, even though it tends to complicate life during the regular hours when people expect me to be alert.

Some nights my 12-year-old grandson gets up also, and brings his comforter out to the couch, where he reads for a while before going back to bed. Usually we don't talk much -- we understand each other's rhythms -- but one night recently he was in a chatty mood.

He said that when he has trouble sleeping it's because his mind begins churning in ways he can't turn off. What he thinks about is the future, often fantastic thoughts about the future that probably won't come true, although he's not sure about that.

As I listened, it occurred to me that although we are at opposite ends of a spectrum of life, in certain ways we are similar. He is his father's only son; I was my father's only son. He has long blond hair; I have long white hair. Both of us have had childhoods where people never stopped saying that we were *so* smart, (BTW, to a kid, that does not feel like a compliment.)

He told me he learns most of what he knows not from school, but on his own or from his friends. He said he heard of a kid who was so smart they sent him to Harvard at age seven. I told him I'd hate to be that kid because I'd be way too small to go out with any of the girls.

Compared to him, I've lived six lifetimes. When I'm awake and restless I think about the past, as opposed to the future. His dreams lie ahead in life, mine probably passed me by some time ago.

On this particular occasion, however, something new happened. After he got a snack and went back to bed, I went back to my room and fell asleep by imagining something new:

Dreams of a future.

***

The news of today:

* Congressional leaders add stimulus checks to relief bill as they near a deal (WashPo)

* Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, congratulated President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. and pleaded with Republicans privately not to join an effort by House members to throw out the results. (NYT)

* Trump lashes out at McConnell for recognizing Biden’s victory: ‘People are angry!’ (WashPo)

* The United States expanded its rollout of the newly approved COVID-19 vaccine to hundreds of additional distribution centers, inoculating thousands more health care workers in a mass immunization expected to reach the general public in the coming months. Political leaders and medical authorities have launched a media blitz avowing the safety of the vaccines while urging Americans to maintain social distancing and mask-wearing. [Reuters]

* California Attorney General Xavier Becerra sued Amazon in an effort to get it to comply with a state Covid-19 safety investigation. [CalMatters]

* U.S. retail sales declined in November amid a surge in coronavirus cases and new business restrictions in some states. (WSJ)

* Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s coronavirus restrictions sent migrant workers fleeing. To get them home, the government offered special trains. But the trains would spread the virus across the country. (NYT)

* Trump is considering pushing to have a special counsel appointed to advance a federal tax investigation into Hunter Biden, setting up a potential showdown with incoming acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen. Trump has consulted on the matter with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, White House counsel Pat Cipollone and outside allies. [AP]

* MLB Retrospectively Elevates Negro Leagues to Major League Status (WSJ)

* As the number of women in U.S. jails has risen, so have deaths and medical errors in facilities ill-equipped to handle this growing population. (Reuters)

* The U.S., Britain, Canada and others are hedging their bets, reserving vaccine doses that far outnumber their populations, as many poorer nations struggle to secure enough. (NYT)

* With three weeks left before polls close in two U.S. Senate runoff elections in Georgia that will determine the balance of power in Washington, a record number of early voters cast their ballots in person in multiple counties. Election officials in Richmond County, which includes Augusta, said one of the county’s major voting centers recorded 2,022 in-person voters by 5 p.m. on Monday, marking a single-day record for early voting. [HuffPost]

* Hopeful sign: Midwestern states see drop in new virus cases (AP)

* Hundreds of native North American plants, often dismissed as weeds, deserve a lot more respect, according to a new study. These plants, distant cousins of foods like cranberries and pumpkins, actually represent a botanical treasure now facing increased threat from climate change, habitat loss and invasive species. (NPR)

* The New Year’s Eve celebration in New York will not have a public audience this year to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The Times Square Alliance and Countdown Entertainment announced that the event will not allow people to gather in Times Square on Dec. 31 this year and instead will be broadcast for TV and internet viewers. (The Hill)

* Supreme Court to Hear NCAA Case on Student-Athlete Compensation (WSJ)

* Mar-a-Lago neighbors to Trump: Spend your post-presidency elsewhere. (WashPo)

* Bingo Much Less Competitive Lately (The Onion)

***

A candy-colored clown they call the sandman
Tiptoes to my room every night
Just to sprinkle stardust and to whisper
Go to sleep, everything is alright

I close my eyes then I drift away
Into the magic night, I softly say
A silent prayer like dreamers do
Then I fall asleep to dream my dreams of you

In dreams I walk with you
In dreams I talk to you
In dreams you're mine all of the time
We're together in dreams, in dreams

But just before the dawn
I awake and find you gone
I can't help it
I can't help it
If I cry
I remember that you said goodbye

It's too bad that all these things
Can only happen in my dreams
Only in dreams

In beautiful dreams

-- Songwriter: Boudleaux Bryant 

-30-

There You'll Be

There have been many social consequences of this pandemic here and around the world. One is described in today's news summaries -- the disruption of the ancient custom of men meeting up in coffeehouses in Turkey.

A similar custom exists in Afghanistan teahouses, where Afghans  favor a frosted almond candy called nuqui with their tea. 

Here in Western countries, of course, we enjoy our coffees and teas more based in the Italian and French traditions, with various types of lattes and cappuccinos as the big favorites among the current generations of Americans. But business at cafes everywhere is suffering these days.

I started taking my kids to coffeehouses when they were very young. Recently, I've wondered whether my two oldest grandsons (12 and 13) aren't at about the right ages to begin accompanying me on my trips to coffee houses, at least once some of the Covid restrictions are lifted around here.

It's my assumption that children of that age, on the cusp of the transition from kid to teen, are prime candidates for carrying on our family tradition of conversation over coffee, as well as the occasional pastry or bagel.

For many years, as a freelance blogger covering the tech and media industries for BNET and 7x7.com, I met the people launching startup companies in the Bay Area in local San Francisco coffee houses.

There, I met entrepreneurs from Lyft, Uber, Airbnb, Flipbook, Facebook, Twitter, Google and dozens of others. I eventually, in 2012, published an ebook, "30 Startups to Know Now" with a tiny publishing startup called Hyperink. I made a small amount of money off writing that was decidedly positive in tone about the entrepreneurial efforts going on all around me here in the heart of Silicon Valley.

Does it seem strange for someone known as an investigative reporter, normally doing highly critical stories about companies and others in power, to be writing positive profiles? Well, people are complicated, and I'm no exception.

The same skill set that can take down one company can build up another -- critical journalism is the flip side of marketing and PR. Maybe it says something about me that I never saw any contradiction; then again, as a journalist, I'm unlikely to ever stick to one position for longer than a New York minute anyway.

Which reminds me of that old line when a tourist stops a stranger on the streets of New York and asks, "Excuse me, sir, do you know what time it is or should I just go f**k myself?"

***

This pandemic holiday season, I gravitate to romantic movies of one stripe or another. Since it was the 79th anniversary of Pearl Harbor recently, I watched the movie of the same name.

Of course, it's about a terrible event of war but also about people and how they find each other in troubled times. If anything, against the backdrop of an extreme conditions, people may forge deeper links faster than in normal times.

A veteran friend of mine calls it "romantic intrigue."

This pandemic is called a war and the way we encounter each other is not unlike during WW 2 -- lots of distance and separation and barriers, but mutual attraction will still find a way.

At least that's my wish this holiday season -- that somehow lovers will find one another. 

If anything, the romantic in me likes the idea that people may have to engage in a longer courtship, unable to consummate the relationship, as we all observe masking and social distance, avoiding hugs, let alone intimate gatherings in restaurants and bars.

But once the restrictions are lifted, who knows!

***

 Today's headlines:

* ‘A Shot of Hope’: What the Vaccine Is Like for Frontline Doctors and Nurses -- Even as medical workers lined up for America’s first shots, many of them recalled nightmarish moments from the pandemic. (NYT)

* ‘This is the reality’: Newsmax and One America grapple uneasily with Biden’s electoral college victory (WashPo)

* De Blasio Warns of Another Full Shutdown -- Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York said the increasing amount of hospitalizations from the coronavirus could lead to another shutdown of nonessential businesses. (Office Of The New York City Mayor)

* After weeks of negotiations, a bipartisan working group couldn’t compromise on blocking lawsuits from people who say they were negligently exposed to COVID-19. The lawmakers, led by Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Mitt Romney (R-Utah), reached an agreement on extensions of unemployment insurance, small business aid and vaccine funding, but Manchin was the only Democrat who supported a new version of a clampdown on lawsuits. [HuffPost]

* Poor countries face long wait for vaccines despite promises (AP)

* A group advocating media freedom says a record number of journalists have been detained around the world because of their work.The Committee to Protect Journalists says in its annual report released on Tuesday that at least 274 journalists are jailed as of December 1, the highest number since it started compiling data in the early 1990s. (NHK)

* Turkey’s Coffeehouses, a Hub of Male Social Life, May Not Survive Virus -- Coffeehouses, mainstays of Turkish neighborhoods for centuries, are suffering under pandemic restrictions — particularly a ban on games. Regulars fear losing “our jokes, our laughter.” (NYT)

* Hopes for a ‘normal’ Christmas fade as pandemic rages in Europe and North America (WashPo)

* Teacher shortages caused by early retirements and quarantines force some administrators to recruit parents and bus drivers to baby-sit classrooms; “it’s all hands on deck.” (WSJ)

* Poll: Despite Record Turnout, 80 Million Americans Didn't Vote.  (NPR)

* The fringe right-wing lawyer who filed a court challenge to Trump’s election loss in Georgia has called on supporters to stock up on “Second Amendment supplies” — presumably firearms and ammunition — to prepare for what he apparently envisions as an apocalyptic future. “Our leader is Donald Trump, not Biden,” attorney Lin Wood tweeted. [HuffPost]

* Russian Officers Were Near Navalny When He Was Poisoned, Report Says -- The agents, from a unit with poisonous chemicals expertise, were tracked by their telephones, the Bellingcat investigative group said, the strongest evidence of Moscow’s involvement in the nerve agent attack. (NYT)

* California Gavin Newsom faces a serious recall effort and a worsening situation with Covid-19. (CNN)

* As Americans die by the thousands, Trump cronies cut in line for coronavirus treatments and vaccines (WashPo)

* A study commissioned by the U.S. Department of Justice found that incarcerated people who participate in educational opportunities behind bars were 40% less likely to return to prison. (KQED)

* The U.S. population has grown about 8% over the past decade to more than 332 million people, according to a Census Bureau analysis released before the results of the decennial count (WSJ)

* Cats recover from COVID-19 very quickly, scientists want to find out why (Jerusalem Post)

* What’s Next for Trump Voters Who Believe the Election Was Stolen? -- Some are certain the election was fraudulent. Others aren’t so sure. What becomes of their skepticism has important implications for American democracy. (NYT)

* California fines Uber $59 million, threatens to suspend license over refusal to hand over sexual assault data (WashPo)

* Package Thief Makes Off With Entire Front Porch (The Onion)

***

"There You'll Be" -- Faith Hill

When I think back on these times,
And the dreams we left behind,
I'll be glad cause I was blessed to get,
To have you in my life,

When I look back on these days,
I look and see your face,
You were right there for me.

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky,
In my heart there'll always be a place for you,
For all my life,

I'll keep a part of you with me,
And everywhere I am there you'll be,
And everywhere I am there you'll be,

Well you showed me how it feels,
To feel the sky within my reach,
And I always will remember all,
The strength you gave to me,
Your love made me make it through,
Ohh I owe so much to you,
You were right there for me.

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky,
In my heart there'll always be a place for you,
For all my life,

I'll keep a part of you with me,
And everywhere I am there you'll be,
And everywhere I am there you'll be,

Cause I always saw you in my light, my strength,
And I wanna thank you now for all the ways,
You were right there for me, you were right there for me
You were right there for me,
For always

In my dreams I'll always see you soar above the sky,
In my heart there'll always be a place for you,
For all my life,

I'll keep a part of you with me,
And everywhere I am there you'll be
And everywhere I am there you'll be

Songwriter: Warren Diane Eve

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