Thanksgiving Eve

The plans are made. We are staying in. My brother invited us over for dinner but we declined. He is one who doesn't think COVID is all that serious. He just came back from a hunting trip in Wisconsin (he got a nice buck and one of the grandsons got his deer as well) and discovered a different world. The restaurant he went into had every booth and table filled with people none of whom wore masks. I have read that the governor has had trouble both enforcing a mask mandate and getting any emergency measures going thanks to a Repthuglican legislature. My sister and her partner are also staying in and not having anybody in for dinner. Both have medical conditions that make that very sensible.

While the pundits are busy conducting autopsies on the recent election I have a few observations of my own:

 First the turn out was phenomenal. I can't remember an election where such a large number of people voted. Reports I have seen claim almost 67% of the eligible voters actually turned out--highest percentage for the last 100 years.

 Second, I think this year and 2016 actually show that we are a society searching for a path into the future and completely split on what that path should be. Biden was right to describe himself as a "caretaker." I heard this morning that a shift of only 60K votes over 4 or 5 states would have won the day for #45--a mirror image for what happened in 2016 when he did win. Many of those who supported #45 in 2016 still support him. Many of those who support Biden this time are tepid in their support. They want to see something from the administration which addresses their concerns. Given what I have seen on each side I can see the possibility that both parties might split into 2 or more factions over the next four years. The "Progressive" wing may not be very happy with Biden and there is a part of the Republicans who aren't pleased with #45, the Q-Anon cadre, or the remnants of the Tea Party. The election of 2024 might be another Donnybrook. 

 Third, for the first year of Biden's term the coronavirus will still dominate. Three vaccines are likely to be approved over the next month and the companies have already been producing large numbers of doses of the likely candidates even before the end of stage 3 trials. Those doses will be ready to ship as soon as approval is given. But as some of the experts have said we have two problems: the logistical difficulties of distributing two that require refrigeration (one at -100F or thereabout) and whether people will accept the vaccine. I have already heard reports of anti-vexers saying they won't because they don't trust vaccines generally. I have also heard the members of minority communities aren't entirely sold on the idea because of the history of medical abuses in those communities. The Tuskegee experiments are most often mentioned. And then there are those like myself, Mom and my brother. We are not necessarily against it but we will wait for a bit to see how it works in wide spread use. We aren't seriously inconvenienced by masking and social distancing and we were avoiding crowds before the virus came along.

Fourth, the economy isn't going to come roaring back like #45 claimed. Too many people are out of work. If new legislative measures aren't coming before the end of the year quite a lot of people (10M+) face eviction as of Dec. 31. The jobs many depended on aren't coming back soon, if ever, because the small businesses they worked for are gone and the big firms are cutting payroll also. The latest unemployment measures announced this morning said 770M+ filed for first time unemployment last week.  Shadow Stats lists the official unemployment at about 7% but their own calculations based one how the Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated that metric before 1994 (when they decided to erase several categories of people without jobs) stand at better than 25%. 

Fifth, the states and local governments have been hit hard between the massive unemployment claims, the huge hit on taxes that aren't coming in, the additional funding due to the virus. And, so far, the Republican Senate has been unwilling to provide much relief and what they say they would provide come with a lot of strings which limit how the states can use it. Most of the states were in financial trouble before the pandemic and their position has only been worsened since.