Being a prominent politician carries hazards that are specific to the profession; basically one mistake can alter the course of their careers. Not that I have any particular sympathy for them, I don't. But Ted Cruz fleeing Texas for Cancun during a weather emergency certainly branded him in ways he'll find difficult to overcome if he is to ever achieve his ambitions to reach the White House.
And Gavin Newsom attending a posh party unmasked during the pandemic seems to be as much the reason as any that he faces the prospect of being the first California governor recalled since Grey Davis. The smart money is that the recall will fail, partly because there is no superhero like Arnold Schwarzenegger to beat him at the polls, plus Newsom remains popular with most Californians.
Indeed, most of the time, even the stupidest of acts have little consequence. Lindsey Graham's been making headlines for vowing to kill any gangs that come after him with an AR-15. The last I checked, there aren't any gangs headed his way; in fact the only gang going after politicians was Trump's Capitol riot mob and it's unclear what they would have done to Graham had they encountered him on Jan. 6th.
Andrew Cuomo is a different matter. Now there's a politician in major trouble, IMHO, with so many accusers of sexual harassment and a couple other scandals, including jumping the line to get his family vaccinated against Covid-19 early. There's an obvious double standard when it comes to powerful men accused of sexual misbehavior -- Democrats freely criticized Trump but some of them continue to defend Cuomo.
Of course, Republicans impeached Clinton but stood by Trump. Maybe the larger problem is that the parties are so polarized, everything logical gets tainted in the process. One of today's headlines reports that the killing of bears and wolves in Montana has become politicized, much as mask-wearing and vaccines have been all over the red states and red parts of blue states.
Here in California, for example, a thirty-something friend of mine from the Central Valley says she is already vaccinated because so many Trump sympathizers in her area refuse to do so. Thus the age restrictions are being ignored by health providers who don't want their vaccine doses to go to waste.
The ultimate political irony will be if those who bought Trump's lies about Covid-19 and election fraud don't get the vaccine, and their numbers dwindle due to the pandemic, making future elections even more difficult for them to win. I'll resist the temptation to say they'll be getting what they deserve, since this disease is far more pernicious than that.
As dangerous mutations proliferate, the lack of herd immunity due to anti-vaxxers may well expose us all to new threats of illness and death even if we have taken the vaccine. There will always be a lag time before the vaccines are adjusted to account for a new variant; in that period more will sicken and die needlessly thanks largely to the politicization of mask-wearing.
So much of all this comes down to "fake news" and the conspiracy theories that the Trump era has ushered in. As much as honest journalists and political leaders try to reverse the damage, we are fighting a tsunami of lies. For the moment it's a standoff, but there's no guarantee in the long run that the liars won't win the day.
***
Here's some non-fake news:
* New York City, long buoyed by the flow of commuters into its towering office buildings, faces a cataclysmic challenge, even when the pandemic ends. (NYT)
* The high-profile trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer who knelt on George Floyd's neck as he lay dying in May 2020, began Monday. Chauvin, 45, is charged with second- and third-degree murder as well as manslaughter in Floyd's death. He has pleaded not guilty to all counts. [HuffPost]
* “She’s free”: Traffic in Suez Canal resumes after stranded ship refloated (Reuters)
* Ship Happens: Coffee, Cars, IKEA Furniture Among The Objects Stuck At The Suez (NPR)
* 15.5% of U.S. Population Is Vaccinated (CNN)
* Biden urges states to reimplement mask mandates after CDC director said she’s ‘scared’ about rising cases (WaPo)
* Biden’s Chance to Save the Everglades (NYT)
* WHO Report Into Covid-19 Origins Leaves Key Questions Unanswered (WSJ)
* Bills to ban transgender kids from sports try to solve a problem that doesn’t exist (WaPo)
* Water Restrictions Coming in California. (California Today)
* The Creek Fire was the largest single wildfire in California’s history. Now, it’s factoring into new national forest management plans. [The Fresno Bee]
* Historic Amazon Union Vote Count Begins This Week For Alabama Warehouse (NPR)
* Biden targets big offshore wind energy expansion to fight climate change (Reuters)
* A Brazilian pilot working for wildcat miners escaped death when his plane went down in a remote area. He walked through the jungle for 36 days before being rescued. (NYT)
* Three groundbreaking journalists saw the Vietnam War differently. It’s no coincidence they were women. (WaPo)
* NCAA Faces Showdown Over Player Compensation—and Future of College Sports (WSJ)
* Each May in the small Greek village of Lagadas, a group of celebrants upholds a three-day tradition that incorporates a range of age-old fire-walking rites. (NYT)
* Search for Alien Life Moves Well Beyond Mars (WSJ)
* In Montana, Bears and Wolves Become Part of the Culture Wars (NYT)
* Bottles Of Wine Return To Earth After Year In Space (The Onion)
***
This is a must read: Bob Dylan at 80 <https://www.theguardian.com/
(Thanks to my old friend Martin Abraham.)
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