Whitcomb: A Quiet Month, Except for Traitor Trump’s Terrorists; Vexing Vaccinations

Sunday, January 10, 2021

Robert Whitcomb, Columnist

 

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Robert Whitcomb, columnist

“There, on the black bough of a snow-flecked maple,
Fearless and gay as our love,
A bluejay cocked his crest!
Oh who can tell the range of joy
Or set the bounds of beauty?’’

-- From “A Winter Bluejay,’’ by Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)

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 “Today’s  {last Wednesday’s} violent assault on our Capitol, an effort to subjugate American democracy by mob rule, was fomented by Mr. Trump. His use of the presidency to destroy trust in our election and to poison our respect for fellow citizens has been enabled by {Republican} pseudo political leaders whose names will live in infamy as profiles in cowardice.”

-- Former Defense Secretary (under Trump) Gen. James Mattis

 

It is scary that a large part of the  national Republican Party has become a vessel for ruthless power-seekers without any moral principles who  endlessly promote lies and are animated, as is their leader, by a narcissistic nihilism.

 

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It’s good that in January in these parts you see the underlying structures of many things, the skeletons of them, so to speak, with the leaves off the deciduous trees and other vegetation reduced, too.  More architecture than painting. Another nice thing is that the colors of birds, e.g., cardinals, stand out more vividly against the brown, gray and white of January than they do in greener times.

 

I love the sere of coastal marshes at this time of year, especially at sunrise and sunset.

 

Of course, it’s also good to know that winter will end in a few weeks.

 

January always seemed to me a quiet time in which you can catch your breath, before obligations start piling up again later in the winter – tax returns, etc. It’s a good time to catch up on sleep.

 

We send out a lot of New Year’s cards well into this month. They arrive more reliably at their destinations than Christmas cards, especially this past holiday season, what with the pandemic and damage to the U.S. Postal Service by the Trump regime under its corrupt postmaster general, Louis DeJoy. (Being corrupt and slavishly, even criminally, loyal have often seemed to be the main requirements for high-level employment in this destructive regime.)

 

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PHOTO: Eric Harrison CC: 2.0

Driving to Newport on a bright winter’s day, with shimmering views from the bridges of the Ocean State’s archipelago, is exhilarating, as is  sitting with an old friend at  the all-weather patio of a mostly empty restaurant  on the Newport waterfront with the light pouring in. But let’s hope that the eatery is crowded come spring.

 

Don’t Burn It for That

I like to sit by a crackling log fire as much as the next person. Indeed, we recently bought a backyard fire pit as a way to expand our winter living space in these times of pandemic claustrophobia. Even a lot of people burning logs in fire pits or fireplaces produce relatively minor pollution. It’s a compact, sensual, aesthetic experience.

 

Of course, with most fireplaces, having a fire loses your house more warmth than it gains, as it draws heat from the house up the chimney. Still, it’s very pleasant, if you can sit close enough to it.

 

In any event, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker’s administration is wrong to let wood-burning electric-power plants that now don’t meet state environmental standards get subsidies from rate payers. Yes, New England has lots of wood, but burning it in large quantities to generate electricity would mean much higher carbon emissions in the region, worsening global warning.  Cutting down a lot more trees would  obviously reduce forests’ ability to absorb carbon dioxide and emit oxygen, as well as harm  wildlife and increase erosion by water.

 

Such clean-energy sources as solar, wind and geothermal are becoming cheaper and more efficient by the year. They’re the way to go. Burning wood to generate electricity is a terrible idea.

 

By the way, I remember that back in the days before Jiffy Pop and microwave stoves, how much fun it was to popcorn by putting the seeds in a screened frame over the fire and constantly shaking and flipping it. It took close attention but the popcorn you got seemed tastier than what you get now, or maybe that’s just misleading nostalgia. Of course, we soaked the product in butter and sprinkled on lots of salt: a slow-motion heart-disease developer.

 

 

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Another sign that Massachusetts will continue to be a very rich state: Despite the pandemic and the national recession, it caused state tax revenues rose 8.8 percent in December from the year-earlier, pre-COVID month!

 

 

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Vaccination trouble

Vaccination Confusion Continues

Rhode Island, Massachusetts and other states are struggling to obtain and distribute COVID-19 vaccines. That’s to a large extent because of a lack of national coordination by the Trump regime. I think that things will get better in the next few weeks. Hang in there.

 

Just out of curiosity, I checked in with my primary-care doctor’s office and my pharmacist last week to see what was happening with vaccinations. They said: “We don’t know; we’re still waiting for directions.’’

 

What an awful job to have been a governor since last March. New England’s generally highly competent governors – three Democrats and three Republicans -- in this unprecedented-since-1918 situation have made plenty of mistakes in dealing with the pandemic. But given its complexities, mysteries and unpredictability, and lack of help from Washington, it’s surprising they haven’t made more. Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo, heading to Washington to become commerce secretary, will miss home but probably not the governorship.

 

Meanwhile, I’m hearing more and more from physicians and other health-care people about the benefits of taking (carefully!) zinc, Vitamin D-3 and quercetin to help ward off COVID-19.

 

I wonder how many thousands of Americans have been killed by Trumpists refusing to wear masks in close quarters. Not wearing masks is a sign of fealty to their fuhrer. I notice that many, perhaps most, of the rioting thugs he sent to invade the Capitol last Wednesday weren’t wearing them.

 

 

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President Donald Trump

National GOP Enabled a Sick, Evil Man

The defeat of the two Trump-sucking-up, insider-trading crooks in the Georgia Senate race is satisfying for all  who revere democracy. Still, with so many millions having voted for the neo-fascist traitor, kleptocrat, nonstop liar and all-around sociopath still staining the Oval Office, our democratic republic’s condition remains fragile.   His followers have believed (or wanted to believe) every lie peddled by Trump and his GOP enablers.

 

And yes, there was plenty of corruption in the presidential election – by the Republicans who erroneously call themselves “conservatives’’ when they are anything but.  Consider their voter suppression,  mostly based on race, bogus lawsuits,  lies, lies, lies, lies, especially as part of conspiracy theories that would have made the Nazis proud, threats of violence and so on.

 

After historians review the 2020 election, they’ll write about Trump’s and his servile politician enablers’ relentless attempts to steal the election. But then, the GOP has been sliding deeper and deeper into neo-fascism since former House Speaker Newt Gingrich started pouring poison into the body politic in the ’90s.

 

I suspect that much of the secret to Trump’s success – and I’ve watched him for decades -- in getting so many suckers to vote for him goes back to his alternate-reality TV show The Apprentice. There, he came across to the naive and ignorant as a strong, charismatic leader/businessman, someone who would humiliate those they resented in a changing world, and speak to their hunger for second-hand power.  And his theatricality distracted some from their empty, anxious lives.

 

That other than with the show, he was a disastrous businessman, whose career was soaked in serial bankruptcies (even with his sleazy Daddy giving him hundreds of millions of dollars), theft and fraud, meant nothing to his ferocious followers; most of them got/get their “news’’ from watching/hearing nonstop lies on far-right TV and listening to rich far-right con men and con women on radio. Trump’s fans aren’t big on research, or reading, for that matter. They’re too intellectually lazy for that.

 

But the folks who have watched him most closely over the years – his fellow New Yorkers - -- know his toxicity. No wonder he got tiny percentages of the vote there.

 

The sort of kleptocratic autocracy sought by Trump is the norm in history. We’ve had a scare with his regime. There will be other, more competent,  deeply cynical and power-hungry neo-fascists – the likes of the amoral Sen. Ted Cruz or  Sen. Josh Hawley –  who may be far more successful in destroying  American democracy than the vicious but undisciplined Trump. Cruz and Hawley are among the worst of the Republicans retailing hateful lies to retain the support of Trump’s deranged base. They have blood on their hands.

 

The national Republican Party has been indelibly stained by its elected officials’ enabling of Trump and his toxic tribe. Real conservatives should quit it NOW and form a responsible center-right party. The Trump mob’s invasion of the Capitol last Wednesday is an inevitable result of the party’s cynicism, cowardice and corruption in refusing to block Trump in his ceaseless, manic drive for power, money and attention. And we shouldn’t forget the responsibility of the Mercers, the Kochs, the Adelsons and other plutocrats who have bankrolled GOP politicians in order to get policies that will further enrich themselves -- in money and power.

 

We can only hope that Trump in the fullness of time ends up in prison for the rest of his life, for treason, fraud, incitement to riot,  perjury, tax evasion…. The list goes on.  Hanging would be more satisfying and fully justified.

 

 

The District Back Then

“This is what you’ve gotten, guys.”
 

-- Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, during Wednesday’s riot, yelling at Sen. Ted Cruz and some other neo-fascist GOP colleagues in the Capitol who were leading the lie-and-demagoguery-filled attempt to undermine Biden’s election.

 

Trump's acting defense secretary, Christopher Miller,  presumably at the order of Trump, had refused until it was too late to authorize the use of National Guard to defend the Capitol, making its storming easier.   And the Capitol Police acted (intentionally?) hapless. Were Russia-connected agents involved? How much of this attack was closely coordinated with Trump and his henchmen? Questions, questions….

 

Watching the ignoramuses, gun fetishists, KKK-style white racists, QAnons and simply suckers, and all of them traitors, crashing into the Capitol at their fuhrer’s command last Wednesday in Washington took me back to a quieter, easier time in that city, in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, when I’d visit friends there.  The District then still often had the air of a sometimes sleepy Southern town, and there was far, far less security. The assassinations, riots and terrorist attacks, especially, of course, 9/11, that would come in future years would lead to much tighter restrictions in public buildings, including those hideous barriers in front of the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue.

 

But back then you could wander around with considerable freedom. I remember one in particular, in 1961, with my friend Al d’Ossche, a native of New Orleans (where he learned to become a terrific performer of jazz and other music) who had moved to Washington and quickly learned its byways. We’d wander the Capitol building and nip into the offices of senators and congresspeople, often chatting with them and their staffers.

 

I particularly remember meeting in the hall with Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater, the libertarian/conservative from Arizona (where he took many beautiful photos) and New York Sen. Jacob Javits, who was a member of that now mostly extinct species  (Nelson) “Rockefeller Republican’’. Javits grew increasing grouchy by being held up by a couple of kids as Goldwater continued to talk with us, maybe because I told him I had read his book The Conscience of a Conservative. I wonder if they missed an (unimportant) vote on the Senate floor as a result.

 

On another trip in those years, I dropped by the office of my old-fashioned Yankee Republican congressman from southeastern Massachusetts, Hastings Keith. He asked me: “What do you actually know about how Congress really works?’’ Then, without waiting, he explained how it did. And, God knows, in those days Congress often worked pretty well because Democrats and Republicans were frequently more than happy to work together. For that matter, unlike now, they also often socialized together, including with their families.

 

On that and other trips, I found it easy to wander through assorted grand buildings housing federal departments with virtually no security apparent. One was the White House, where the man in the guard house (a Marine, I think) waved us through. We explained to a guide in the public part of the mansion that we wanted to look at the official – and large -- official portrait of Harry Truman, which Al’s maternal grandmother, Greta Walker, had painted.  The guide led us there and showed us some parts of the White House that were then off-limits to the general public.

 

Truman is my favorite Democratic president. My least favorite are the genocidal Andrew Jackson – crook, slaveowner and mass murderer of Native Americans, whose portrait Trump has appropriately hung in the Oval Office -- and the extreme racist prig Woodrow Wilson, whose ignorance of Europe and rigidity in dealing with the Senate about the League of Nations killed American participation in it. That was a factor in creating the conditions that led to World War II.

 

Al also showed me such exotic (for back then in America) private-sector sights as the mosque at the Islamic Center of Washington and the National Press Club, with its always crowded bar, which, sadly, we were a tad too young to patronize. Mid-day drinking by journalists, politicians, lobbyists, PR people and other very-Washingtonian groups was far more common then. D.C.’s boozing culture started to go into sharp decline in the ‘80s. It was great unhealthy fun while it lasted.

 

 

Will They Have a Choice?

LifeCareer, a resume and job-search service, reports that a survey showed that about 30 percent of professionals who have been working at home would quit their jobs if asked to return to their offices after the pandemic stops. Really? Many businesses need to get most of their employees back to company offices to regain the sort of group idea creation and teamwork that you get by working together in person.

 

Those refusing to return to work at company offices, at least for, say, three days a week, may find themselves out of jobs. They may have been loyally working from home, but loyalty is mostly a one-way street for companies.

 

 

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President-elect Joe Biden

Foreign Matters

President-elect Biden plans to create a grand alliance to counter Chinese imperialism, and will certainly try to come up with new ways to counter Russian aggression when Putin’s lapdog Trump is no longer in power. It will be hard going but it must be done to reverse the global decline of democracy.

 

Russia, China  and part of  the Republican Party pose the worst threats to American national security.

 

I wonder what will happen to Ivanka Trump’s lucrative brand-licensing deals in China, which the dictatorship there swiftly approved earlier in the Trump regime to curry favor with her father.  And what will happen to Hunter Biden’s 10 percent stake in a Chinese private-equity firm?

 

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