Politics
A strong Democratic friend of mine texted that he was glad President Donald J. Trump would not (as looks likely) attend Joe Biden’s inauguration. The inauguration is likely to be the least-attended in memory because of COVID-19 protocols, which Biden is more likely to observe than hypocrites such as
Racism
The moment of my real race awakening came in 1955 with the murder of Emmett Till in Mississippi for supposedly flirting with a white woman. He was a 14-year-old Black boy from Chicago. I was a 14-year-old white boy from The Bronx. Maybe I felt some kind of teenage, Big
Democracy
It was almost four years ago — on Jan. 20, 2017 — two enduring myths were born. First, from the Right: President Donald J. Trump’s inaugural crowd was bigger than that of President Barack H. Obama. Second, from the Left: Trump would destroy American Democracy. As to crowd size, photos taken
Hate crimes
If it is time for the FBI’s annual readout of hate crimes, it is also the time for small hysteria about what a hateful nation we live in. As often happens, the headlines are worse than the actual facts, once a little reason is applied to the scary numbers.
Presidential politics
There is a depressive narrative out there, led by POC (People Of Color), who are not sad that President Donald J. Trump lost — they love that — but that he did not lose by enough. They are downhearted because when Joe Biden said Trump’s beliefs and actions do not reflect
Uncategorized
The third night of the Democratic National Convention was planned as Ladies Night, but the trophy was taken by a man, former President Barack Obama. If that sounds sexist, so be it. Like he did when we first saw him on the national stage at the 2004 DNC, Obama lit
Immigration
By tradition, the political season begins after Labor Day, but in a year where most other tradition has been turned in its ear, both sides have jumped the gun. Democrats and Republicans are running attack commercials, either on TV or online, and the Joe Biden camp has just finished a
Coronavirus
To me, it is not the number — 100,000 Americans dead — nor the speed, since Feb. 6 in Santa Clara County, Calif. The CDC reported a record high 80,000 deaths from the plain old flu in 2017. Were you aware of that number? I wasn’t, perhaps because it
ICE
The ICE roundup of 680 suspected illegals in Mississippi got quite a bit of play, as expected. When it broke I happened to be watching Shepard Smith on Fox News, who practically came to tears as he described people being “rounded up” and a teenager crying as a parent was
Culture
For more than two decades, some Americans have vilified their presidents. The visceral level of hatred is unsettling to me. George H.W. Bush was strongly disliked by the Left, but the disdain was expressed as ridicule rather than poison, portraying him as a man hopelessly out of touch. The