Thoughts on a Thursday

Has it really been a full week since Thanksgiving? Yikes! I'd be bummed if I was still working and a week off from work flew by this quickly. I'm doing my best to make the most of each day as it's the only way I can think of to push back against the ever-increasing pace of days and years as they pass me by. I have a sense of guilt that creeps in if I allow myself too much downtime. It's the way I'm wired and I'm okay with that. 

Brad, Monique, and Roger (Moniques's father) stopped by Thanksgiving day to drop off some tasty treats for us. How nice of them! They were making the rounds. We chatted socially distanced from one another and masked, catching up on so much that's happened in our lives since we last saw them nearly one year ago. Later in the day, we had a Zoom meeting hosted by my brother Bryan in Oregon. It was a lot of fun and a nice substitute for actually getting together in this year of quashed plans due to the pandemic.

I prefer not to have to write about what follows but I do want my blog to be a running dialog of what's happening not only in my world but in our world. Here goes.

The 2020 election was one month ago and won handily by Joe Biden but Trump refuses to concede and is now saying he has no plans to attend Joe Biden's inauguration nor will he be inviting the Biden's to the White House in a long-standing tradition prior to the inauguration. Classy! He's also putting out propaganda videos and Tweets proclaiming the election was rigged against him and blah blah blah. I have several people in my life who believe him. Some of them are family.

Cult of Personality

I get that we all have our go-to sources for news and opinion and hopefully, that includes sources that we don't agree with. I would like to believe that the truth lies somewhere between the two but that's not at all what we're experiencing in the US. One of us, progressives or conservatives, is being propagandized in a most severe way and until it stops, I see no hope for us ever coming together. None. It makes no sense to support a president who is on record as having told 22,247 documented lies (as of August 27th) during his time in office. It would be an affront to my intelligence to have someone so blatantly lie to me—like living with an alcoholic who claims they're not drinking yet there are vodka bottles hidden throughout the house. Is it worth your dignity to be used that way?

We're told by Trump and his supporters that the Russia investigation was a hoax, ignoring Trump's refusal to sit down with Robert Mueller and testify about his knowledge of what happened and also ignoring the Republican-led Senate investigation that found numerous disturbing connections between Trump's campaign and Russians connected to the Kremlin. They ignore Trump's pardon of Roger Stone who was sentenced to several years in prison for lying to Congress and for witness intimidation as he covered up for the president. And they ignore Trump's attempted quid pro quo with Ukrainian President Zelensky that caused Trump to rightly be impeached. And who tries to sabotage the USPS in an attempt to suppress the vote of a majority of Democrats who planned to vote by mail? Who can support anyone who would do such a thing? I will never, ever understand such gullibility or blind loyalty. And now there's talk of pardons for Trump, his children, and some of his staff. I don't at all recall any of this sort of thing happening with the previous administration.

I have to ask: who's being lied to? Who's being fed propaganda? Is it you? Are you okay with that? I hope you live long enough to see this time in our country's history for what it was and for how you were used.

The coronavirus continues to ravage the country, placing stresses on healthcare workers and facilities in ways they've never seen and in ways that are pushing them to their limits and beyond. Millions of people are unemployed, many unable to home-school their children and work simultaneously. They have no income and many have exhausted what little savings they had. And yet the president says nothing about it. Nearly 3000 people died yesterday from the virus but all he wanted to talk about was the "rigged election". Today, Mitt Romney called Trump's failed leadership on COVID-19 "A great human tragedy, no question". Is this the greatness you voted for when you climbed aboard the Trump train? Why the fuck are you still on it?

I long for the day when we can put this awful presidency and its enablers in our rearview mirror. It's been a lot to have to endure for those of us seeing it for what it is.

The river bottoms have been a blast to play around in lately. It's where I'll be tomorrow.

That's all I've got.