Happy New Year everyone. I'm hopeful that 2020 will be better than 2019. It almost has to be because last year was one of the most divisive in our country's history. Even something seemingly as trivial as whether 2020 is actually the start of a new decade or January 1, 2021 is the start causes conflict though I don't personally have an ax to grind. (Actually, I don't have an ax nor would I have the faintest idea of how to grind it.)
Apparently the vast majority insist we are days into the new decade. Others claim it makes no sense that the decade would start with a zero. Jokingly, I told friends, “If I wrote a book with 10 chapters, the first wouldn't be chapter zero.” I got verbally pummeled. These days, especially on social media, it feels like every comment is potentially fighting words.
It feels like, these past three years have been the most contentious since the Civil War. Grim as it was, in that war approximately 850,000 soldiers died when the total population was 31 million. By today's numbers, 9 million would have died. (This column isn't exactly off to a hilarious start but please bear with me. )
The level of divisiveness is so great when Donald Trump says windmills cause cancer and that a wind powered household won't be able to watch football on TV if it's not windy outside, 40% of the country believe him. (Does he really not understand that solar and wind power are “stored” or does he simply enjoy rattling the cages of his base?”
Or, when Trump claims the climate crisis is a hoax, that “It's just weather and we've always had weather,” 4 out of 10 Americans believe him. I actually heard him say that he thought “Climate change could reverse itself and I have a pretty good instinct for these things as my uncle was a nuclear physicist at M.I.T.” (How the hell does his uncle figure into this?)
Actually, according to Trump, it was his uncle who explained to young Donnie the power of nuclear bombs. I assumed Donnie was 8 or so as his uncle sat him on his knee. Actually, Trump was 36, which apparently means the nuclear bombs at Nagasaki and Hiroshima didn't register with the Donald as powerful.
We're so divisive I guess we're lucky everyone agrees the sun rises in the east. That said, at one of his rabid rallies, if Trump said, “A lot of people tell me they think the 'sun/east bit is an Obama hoax,” I wouldn't surprise if it became an applause line. If I tweeted “It's undeniable, the sun rises in the east,” I'd likely get a tweet back calling me an “elitist.” (I suppose it's possible we can agree that if Trump did in fact shoot somebody on 5th Avenue he wouldn't lose a vote.”)
We could take some comfort that the House has passed over 400 bills, many of which were bipartisan, and sent them to the Senate. The problem is “Moscow Mitch” McConnell, who brags that he's “the Grim Reaper,” has killed them.
As for the 2020 election. Trump has actually said that if he were to lose, the stock market would crash and there could be a civil war. (Is that all?) In suggesting what might happen if he lost in a close race, Trump said, “I can tell you I have the support of the police, the support of the military and the support of the Bikers for Trump – I have the tough people. (Oh that's comforting.)
For every bit of hopefully bipartisan cooperation such as when the House passed the USMCA, Trump’s landmark North American trade deal by a whopping 385–41 margin, it came less than 24 hours after voting to impeach the president. The Republican-held Senate is expected to pass the agreement early next year but only following an impeachment trial that has yet to be scheduled.
That brings us to that likely impeachment trial in the Senate. Moscow Mitch is adamantly determined there will be no witnesses or documents. Good grief. What kind of trial is that? Answer: Like the kind they have in Russia.
Joe Biden said something that hinted at bipartisanship. He indicated, that if he were the Democratic Presidential nominee, he would consider a Republican as his V.P. Then he said he “can't think of one right now.”
Maybe it's just me, but 2020 sounds so futuristic. It suggests an an era of flying cars and teleportation. But in terms of political bipartisanship and unity, it seems like the only thing the country can completely agree on is... we can't agree on anything.
Jack is at: facebook.com/jackneworth, twitter.com/jackneworth and jackdailypress@aol.com
