It has been a long time since I published my last blog. It was 2017 and the beginning of the Trump presidency had started to rear it's ugly head. The United States has changed so much since then. Although the country seemed so divided during the 2016 election, those cracks in our social and political fabric just seemed to get wider and wider as the years have gone by culminating in the January 6th, 2021 Insurrection or some would call it the 2nd American Revolution. How did we get to that point where democracy as we know it in this Country was almost tossed away like some used tissue. If we go back to the year 2017, many of us who couldn't stomach President Trump's loud, obnoxious and brazen manner and cringed at some of his policies particularly around immigration, environment, gender etc., secretly rejoiced in the booming economy that of course President Trump took full credit. That period of exuberance lasted for about two years where towards the end of 2019, the stock market was at all time highs and the economy was at record low unemployment. New Years Eve 2020 was going to ring in a New Year of prosperity. People were celebrating without a care in the world. President Trump was going to be a shoo-in for another four years. Then the wheels fell of the bus. It probably started around the middle of January 2020. The media started reporting on an outbreak in China of a respiratory illness. They said it probably started in December of 2019 and that it was contained to a province in China. Since China seems to have a history of these various outbreaks, I don't believe that many people here in the United States gave it much thought. Probably, the worst most people thought was that it was probably not a good idea to visit China any time soon. Then around the beginning of February 2020, the United States reported it's first case. The world changed as we know it. Again people thought it was an isolated case and nothing to worry about. Much to our chagrin, more and more cases started popping up across the United States. Finally, President Trump decided that he needed a press conference to reassure the American people that there was no reason to panic and that this outbreak would be over in two weeks. Boy was he wrong. Literally two weeks after that press conference the United States along with the rest of the world decided to shut down. Cases kept rising, deaths started to mount, and the health care system globally was on the verge of collapse. Of course fingers started pointing. How could our government along with every other government on this planet been so unprepared. Of course President Trump pointed his finger at China calling it the "China Flu." The fact of the matter is that our government under President Trump cut spending to prevent pandemics as part of his overall tax cut plan. States were competing against each other just to get PPE. To me, there didn't seem like there was a national response to this pandemic. Every state or person was left to fend for themselves. It was around this time that conspiracy theories began to flourish. "Covid was started by the Democrats". " Bill Gates wants to put computer chips in your brain." The more absurd the better. Instead of figuring out how to end this pandemic and to help those people devastated by the pandemic, the issue became a political weapon. We got our measly "stimulus checks" but those checks barely paid our rent or mortgage and was primarily used to pay down consumer debt. Any attempt to deal with these issues on a more fundamental level was met with political opposition. It was better to do nothing than to give the other political party a victory. The suffering by the citizens almost became irrelevant. Small businesses even today are still trying to get emergency funding almost two years after the pandemic started. Isn't that a joke. Also, during this time there were other events going on. In the beginning of the pandemic there were race riots going on primarily because of police shootings. With regards to police brutality it seems like nothing ever changes. I still remember the Rodney King case. However calls to defund the police are just ridiculous as crime would skyrocket without a properly funded police force. Do police officers need to be held accountable for their actions. Absolutely but we have a justice system to deal with that. There was also an election going on. It seemed to me that the whole campaign just became a pissing match about who could do a better job handling the pandemic. President Trump was trying to blame the Democrats for blocking his legislation to get more relief to the people and the Democrats claimed his legislation didn't go far enough. Whatever legislation the Democrats proposed, the Grim Reaper Mitch McDonnell was there to make sure it never saw the light of day. Meanwhile people kept getting sick, dying, losing their jobs but it didn't seem to affect the stock market. For the most part it kept going up. I believe that most people thought that President Trump was going to win re-election. However, by some miracle Joseph Biden became the next President of the United States. It is after that election that our country started to go down the toilet. Former President Donald Trump started challenging the election results in key states. It was the beginning of the "Big Lie". Former President Trump or his henchmen started making ridiculous claims that the votes were tampered with or changed. Although it was later found out thru countless audits that there was no widespread voting fraud in the country, they refused to give up their narrative. With Former President Trump refusing to concede defeat there was legitimate concern that he may not voluntarily leave the Oval Office after the inauguration. These actions undermined the foundations of democracy and set the stage for January 6, 2021. As I watched what happened on January 6th, 2021 I started to cry as what unfolded in front of me was not the peaceful transition of power but the acts of a vengeful mob spurred on by the vitriol of a demagogue that happened to be the former President of the United States. It was democracy at its lowest point. There have many times in my life where I did not like or agree with the winner of a political campaign. The thought of trying to violently overthrow that election was not even fathomable to me as I thought that those type of actions only happened in "Third World" countries. Even though the Former Vice President and members of Congress were threatened with violence, Congress did not have the courage to impeach the man responsible for this eyesore. Shame on them. It was around this time that vaccines became available to most people to try and combat this pandemic. Again the conspiracy theorists saw fresh material. The "Big Lie" didn't seem to working as they were losing every court case. They needed a new rallying cry. Vaccines seem to fit their bill. "Vaccines aren't safe." "We shouldn't be told to wear masks." "We must open up the economy." "They are making up the number of Covid deaths." Unproven treatments were given equal weight with FDA approved vaccines. It was like the world went mad. We were approaching more deaths from this disease than any other but many people still didn't want to take measures to combat this pandemic. What does this mean today almost two years after the pandemic started. Although most people have been vaccinated and many including myself have recieved the booster, cases from the new variant are on the rise. Some countries have already begun to shut down again. Most people I know ask "When will this end." I wish I knew. If I am alive in 10 years, I will look back on my life as the pre-covid and post-covid years.
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