Try to fathom the challenges facing our new President. Not only are we in the throes of a national pandemic so badly mismanaged that untold thousands of people have died unnecessarily. All over the country, our local economies are in shambles, especially small businesses. Millions of people are unemployed. Millions can't afford their rent.
An entire generation of young people have been locked out from leading a normal life, unable to find jobs or make new friends. This has become a very lonely country.
Old people are dying prematurely, taking the wisdom of a lifetime with them. Stories that grandchildren might have heard will never be told.
The U.S. has devolved into a divided nation where half the people believe the nonsense voiced by conspiracy theorists, including that Covid-19 isn't real, that the election was not honest, and that the truth journalists struggle to bring them everyday is "fake news."
This is the essence of what Biden has to deal with. And there may be but a brief moment that the nation is open to the healing he will call for in his speech.
Even that moment will swiftly pass if a sizable subset of the 75 million Trump voters cannot find their way back home to America, which is badly battered and needs all the help it can get.
***
Given the hysteria that has enveloped the media since the January 6th riot, it is comforting that we've made it to Inauguration Day with no further incidents of violence. Although many on the left are calling for revenge for the rebellion that occurred at the Capitol, a wiser course right now is to respect Biden's call for unity.
That is going to be difficult for all sides, but the stakes are high. Achieving political consensus is but one of the steps needed to begin dealing with the largest challenges we face. Climate change looms as the greatest threat to human survival short of Earth being wiped out by an asteroid, and it's time to get down to business and deal with that.
Global temperature increases aren't going to discriminate against rightists or leftists; it's an equal opportunity disaster that is looming.
In addition, the obscene disparity in wealth between the super-rich and everybody else must be addressed before it grows even worse. It is a serious threat to democracy and our domestic tranquility.
There is a major risk that our essential freedoms of speech, press, assembly, and religion will be further eroded in the weeks and months ahead. We have to resist the calls from the left for draconian solutions to the problem of right-wing extremism. *That* problem is one of the heart -- we need to replace the hate in some peoples' hearts with a renewed sense of love and respect for one's neighbors. You can't legislate love.
This may all sound like a lesson preached from some pulpit but I'm no minister and religion is not my long suit. I'm talking about science, economics and liberty; about fairness, balance and tolerance. And, yes, the golden rule.
Personally, I do not feel threatened by ideas, even bad ones. But I do feel threatened when 75 million people subscribe to those bad ideas or at least follow a leader who espouses them. It's time for as many of those 75 million who can do so to come home to the real America and help us get to work on our actual problems, not the chimeras that have been sold by snake oil salesmen.
***
Like most people, my daily life is not really about climate change, economic disparities or the First Amendment at all, but about little things. My days fill up with tiny, irritating details that can prove overwhelming if I put them off, and yet introduce new ambiguities to my life when I try to deal with them.
Take the Covid vaccine. Who knows how the hell to get it? I applied online but don't know if or when that will result in anything. I tried my doctor's office but they have not received any instructions beyond prioritizing health care workers for the vaccine. They know I'm a journalist, so they actually asked me to call them if I find out something.
This state's governor says everyone 65 and older should get vaccinated but there appears to be no process for ensuring that this actually happens. So most of us are left in a state of confusion.
Or take money. Once you retire and are existing on social security checks for your income, you rapidly find yourself well below the poverty line in any part of the country, particularly on this super-expensive west coast. If you've been diligent and saved retirement funds, once you reach a certain age (currently 72) you have to begin cashing in your retirement funds as "mandatory required distributions" and the IRS taxes that money as income.
I'm not against taxation per se but it seems unfair to force this on elderly people who are not rich. The MRD should abolished for low-income people. Rather, they deserve a reward for their responsible saving behavior when others spent everything they earned and more, incurring large debts. It's an example of the mixed-up priorities while the super-rich earn 30 times more in a day than we earn in a lifetime.
So maybe that one isn't a tiny little detail so much as my call for a policy change!
***
On to the headlines:
* Prosecutors filed conspiracy charges related to the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol Jan. 6, saying in a new complaint that three rioters from the right-wing militia group Oath Keepers had acted in an “organized and practiced fashion” and communicated before the breach to create a plan. (WSJ)
* The nation’s capital has been secured with checkpoints, tens of thousands of National Guard troops and miles of fencing and barricades. (Reuters)
* The "Deep State" -- A higher-than-usual number of Trump administration political appointees — some with highly partisan backgrounds — are currently "burrowing" into career positions throughout the federal government, moving from appointed positions into powerful career civil service roles, which come with job protections that will make it difficult for Biden to fire them. (Politico)
* Investigators Eye Right-Wing Militias at Capitol Riot -- The F.B.I. has arrested several members associated with violent right-wing extremist groups known as the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters. (NYT)
* A New Mexico county commissioner who heads Cowboys for Trump was arrested Sunday in Washington by Capitol Police after vowing to bring back his guns for Inauguration Day. Couy Griffin was wanted on an arrest warrant after storming the barricades of the Capitol Jan. 6. He drove back from his New Mexico home in time for the inauguration Wednesday, a journey he chronicled on Facebook. [HuffPost]
* Policymakers are eager to return to the period of low unemployment that preceded the pandemic and are less concerned than in previous eras about sparking inflation and taking on debt. (NYT)
* On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, only two days before Trump is cast out of office, the Trump administration released a 45-page report from its “1776 Commission” that reads in places like a right-wing manifesto: It makes excuses for slavery and the Three-fifths Compromise that declared slaves counted as less than full humans. It also rails against socialism and “identity politics.” [HuffPost]
* U.S. Senate leader McConnell says Trump 'provoked' Jan. 6 riot. “The mob was fed lies. They were provoked by the president and other powerful people,” McConnell said. (Reuters)
* A vast majority of Americans do not approve of the riot at the Capitol. But experts warn that the widespread belief there was election fraud, while false, could have dangerous, lasting effects. (NYT)
* A fresh start for Republicans can come only if they abandon authoritarian populism (WashPo)
* The nation’s military has a history of downplaying white nationalism and right-wing activism, but the siege of the Capitol has created a new urgency for dealing with them. (NYT)
* Lawmakers who objected to election results are cut off from 20 of their 30 top corporate PAC donors (WashPo)
* Another coronavirus variant — separate from the more transmissible one found in Britain — has been linked to multiple large outbreaks in the Bay Area. [The San Francisco Chronicle]
* Most Americans say pandemic is out of control, despite Trump’s assertions, Post-ABC poll finds (WashPo)
* As Kamala Harris formally resigned her Senate seat on Monday, Alex Padilla was officially appointed to replace her, making history as California’s first Latino senator. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) also nominated state Assemblymember Shirley Weber to replace Padilla as secretary of state. She will be the first Black person to hold the role in California. [HuffPost]
* High winds buffet California, raising wildfire danger and cutting power in some areas (WashPo)
***
"Bob Dylan's Dream"
While riding on a train goin' west
I fell asleep for to take my rest
I dreamed a dream that made me sad
Concerning myself and the first few friends I had
With half-damp eyes I stared to the room
Where my friends and I spent many an afternoon
Where we together weathered many a storm
Laughin' and singin' till the early hours of the morn
By the old wooden stove where our hats was hung
Our words were told, our songs were sung
Where we longed for nothin' and were quite satisfied
Talkin' and a-jokin' about the world outside
With haunted hearts through the heat and cold
We never thought we could ever get very old
We thought we could sit forever in fun
But our chances really was a million to one
As easy it was to tell black from white
It was all that easy to tell wrong from right
And our choices they were few and the thought never hit
That the one road we traveled would ever shatter and split
How many a year has passed and gone
And many a gamble has been lost and won
And many a road taken by many a first friend
And each one I've never seen again
I wish, I wish, I wish in vain
That we could sit simply in that room again
Ten thousand dollars at the drop of a hat
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