Month: December 2022

This year compared to the last one – First Day hikes – Slight disappointment from the hiking log – The diminishing COVID mortality rate

The old year wanes, and while it might not have been the best of all possible years, it certainly was better than its predecessor.  Flawed though Biden’s administration undeniably has been, it was a welcome change from the perpetual Sturm und Drang that characterized our 45^th president’s relationships with his staff and with his compatriots in general; and while COVID remains a threat and a disruption, it is on a much more limited scale than that of 2021.  It appears, moreover, that Trump’s influence is diminishing at long last, after the greatly anticipated “red wave” proved illusory and various political leaders belatedly realized that his continued association with the Republican Party played a significant role in this result. 

Hiking has seen something of an upsurge during the pandemic.  Plans are being made in every state for making “First Day Hikes” (free, guided hikes on January 1^st) available at various locations.  I myself will be taking part in a hike tomorrow, albeit not a guided one:  merely a visit to Riverbend Park with various friends.  Today also I went with the Wanderbirds to Jug Bay for a gentle, fairly flat hike of 8 miles.  I was the sweep on this occasion and that was perhaps just as well:  one of the hikers in the group had issues with going down a couple of the steeper descents, so I aided her by having her to walk behind me with her hands placed on my shoulders to give her support. 

Alas, I fell just short of 2000 miles this year on the trails.  I probably would have done more had it not been for the two storms in December, when hiking was not practicable during the days of unrelenting rain. Still I did complete 1958 miles for the year, as well as nearly 280,000 feet of cumulative elevation gain, and that at any rate is a respectable amount.

Normally the week between Christmas and New Year’s is fairly quiet, but this time it has been unexpectedly busy for me, with a birthday party for a friend in downtown DC this past Thursday and another party for this evening.  In an effort to encourage those who celebrate the occasions at functions where the bottle is passed around fairly frequently not to use the roads afterwards, Washington DC is offering free Metro rides for people traveling after 8:00 PM.  I will be in position to test how many take advantage of this arrangement, for I myself will be going downtown tonight, and – my sense of self-preservation being tolerably strong – I have no intention of driving the city streets during New Year’s Eve.

More than 100 million people in the U.S. have tested positive for COVID-19 and more than 1 million have died from it.  But at this point nearly 229 million have been vaccinated, and the mortality rate has gone down precipitously in consequence.  The cumulative mortality rate is currently about 1.1% in the U.S.  However, over the past month the ratio of deaths to new cases is about 0.6%.  In other words, the mortality rate is approaching containable levels, possibly to the extent of the state of emergency being rescinded by the CDC sometime after the winter season ends.  COVID’s mortality rate still remains about three times as great as the influenza mortality rate, but that is a great improvement over what we endured in 2021.

And so, as we approach 2023, all is not quite rose color; but hopes are running high.

Today’s statistics as of 3:30 PM – # of cases worldwide:  664,738,010; # of deaths worldwide: 6,696,792; # of cases U.S.:  102,510,478; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,117,956.

The Arlington Loop – COVID in China – Obesity in American children – Yet another Russian defenestration – Evening statistics

I went with the Vigorous Hikers along the Arlington Loop today.  There were only six of us this year, which is a pity, for conditions could not have been better:  bright and clear, just as yesterday was, but considerably warmer.  When we passed along the Potomac the sunny skies and clarity of the water caused the river to act like a mirror and reflect the facades of the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, and other buildings close to the river bank.

During lunch DG asked me what I thought was causing the great upsurge of COVID cases in China, and I was forced to admit that I was puzzled.  Possibly the rigid lockdown that prevailed for months kept people in isolation to such an extent that they now provide a perfect conductor for the virus now they have been allowed to co-mingle again.  It is also possible that their vaccine is less effective than ours, and it is certain that their vaccination rate is lower.  But no one can advance any explanation with confidence.  Such data that the Chinese medical authorities are permitted to release are simply too unreliable to form a firm basis for any hypotheses.  This issue is not confined to China only.  Now that various restrictions have been lifted, Chinese are resuming travel plans as eagerly as we ourselves did earlier this year.  Several countries, including the U.S., are contemplating enacting a regulation that travelers from China provide proof of a negative COVID test result before they are allowed to enter their destination.

One of the numerous undesirable side effects of the COVID virus is the rise in obesity among children aged 2 to 19.  Many were confined indoors for substantial periods, encouraging a lifestyle that had already become overly sedentary.  One study found that pre-pandemic average screen time was 4 hours per day, but during the pandemic it had increased to 8 hours per day. The obesity rate in this age group has grown from 19.3% in 2019 to 22.4% in 2022.  RK, my friend who teaches in a private school, tells me that the figure of the child teased and bullied by his schoolmates for being overweight, so familiar to those in my generation who attended schools, barely exists now:  so many children in any given class are overweight as to eliminate the possibility of any particular child being singled out for being so.

Yet another Putin critic has died from falling out of a window – in Rayagada, India, of all places.  The main in question was visiting the Odisha district at the time to celebrate his 65^th birthday.  He was Pavel Antov, chair of the committee on agrarian policy, nature management, and ecology of the Legislative Assembly of the Vladimir Region and he seems to have posted a Whatsapp message critical of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – I say “seems,” because fairly quickly after it was posted it was deleted, probably by hands other than his own.  Clearly, Putin’s agents are capable of casting an extremely wide net and anyone who criticizes Putin should confine himself to ground floors only. 

Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide:  662,525,701; # of deaths worldwide: 6,688,344; # of cases U.S.:  102,303,889; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,116,347.

Clear skies after the storm – Hiking in Rock Creek Park – Long COVID causes tantalizingly elusive – Conflicting dietary advice – Evening statistics

We may not have had a white Christmas this year, but we certainly had a very cold one.  Temperatures moderated today, however, and in addition the sky possessed the striking clarity that here generally follows after a prolonged rainstorm.  I once speculated that our area is probably more fortunate in this respect during winter than much of northern Europe, and this theory gained reinforcement when I ate together with various others at a restaurant after hiking in Rock Creek Park.  One grew up in England, one had lived in France for a number of years, and another had spent a similar amount of time in the Netherlands; and they all attested that the weather during the winters there is uniformly gray and dreary.  Our periods of brilliant winter days must come as a revelation to foreign visitors, at least to those from some regions.

We are fortunate in other respects.  How could an outsider have guessed that a city like Washington DC is able to provide trails for a 12½-mile hike during which one’s feet hardly ever touches pavement?  Directly after one turns from Connecticut Avenue onto the Melvin Hazen Trail one is plunged into a scene of forested hills sloping down precipitously to a winding stream that drains into Rock Creek, and after a short distance no buildings can be seen from the bottom of the gorge.  I say 12½ miles because that is the distance we covered today, but it could have been extended easily enough.  The numerous ascents, though relatively brief, cumulated to a total of 2000 feet.  I had expected that, after the incessant rain on Thursday that went on until well into the following morning, that both roads and trails would be covered with ice; but it was not so.  The combination of untrammeled sunlight and continually blowing wind that immediately followed the storm dispersed most of the puddles and the number of icy patches on the trails was surprisingly small.  We could see the effects of the storm, however; there were numerous fallen trees whose trunks and branches sometimes stretched over the trail, which the hike leader said had not been present when they scouted the hike some days earlier.

Long COVID continues to evade explanation.  Scientists are unable to explain why some people wind up with symptoms that continue for months and why a small portion experience symptoms that are more serious and longer-lasting.   At this point some conclusions can be drawn from the data.  Women tend to be more prone to long COVID than men, possibly because their immune systems are stronger and thus react more violently to the virus.  In some cases inflammation resulting from the COVID virus can activate herpes viruses, such as Epstein-Barr, which in turn may (for this finding is tentative) lead to chronic fatigue.  Obesity is almost certainly a factor.  Most of the people afflicted with long COVID should eventually recover, according to Lawrence Purpura, an infectious disease expert at Columbia University.  But an unfortunate minority will remain afflicted with heart and lung problems more or less indefinitely, and what causes persons infected with COVID to develop such predilections remains unknown.

“Say goodbye to rubbery cheese and watery milk! A review of 65 studies in the Journal of Psychiatry & Neuroscience suggests enjoying one or two servings of full-fat dairy daily (regular or lactose-free) cuts the risk of chronic stress in half. Full-fat dairy’s transpalmitoleic acid prevents anxiety-triggering blood sugar lows.”  So say Brenda Kearns and Alexandria Brooks in an article for Woman’s World, and I would love to know how reliable their information source might be.  Not that I’m decrying their conclusions; I am, as the most casual reader of this journal could discern, a tyrophile.  However, in an earlier entry (from October, 2021, to be exact) I noted a recommendation from the Mayo Clinic for seniors over 65 to avoid soft cheeses such as Brie and Camembert, and it’s a bit of a surprise now to be told the exact opposite.  One is reminded of the amazed comment from one of the nutrition experts in Woody Allen’s “Sleeper,” a farcical account of a man who is revived out of cryostatis 200 years into the future, when she learns that at one period in history people ate alfalfa sprouts to safeguard their health:  “But didn’t they have any deep fat? thick-cut steaks? hot fudge sundaes?”

Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 662,042,676; # of deaths worldwide: 6,686,858; # of cases U.S.:  102,247,575; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,116,095.  It must be said that the spikes in COVID infections and deaths, though troubling, are considerably lower than those of 2020 and 2021 at the same time of the year.  Perhaps, after all, the CDC will withdraw COVID’s state of emergency status after the end of winter.

Lack of opportunity to hike for the past two weeks – The pre-Christmas storm – Lower life expectancy in the U.S. – COVID in China – Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems – The conclusions of the Jan. 6 investigating committee – The upcoming committee report from Georgia – Evening statistics

I have said little of hiking in the past few entries, due to the uncooperative nature of the weather.   I went with the Vigorous Hikers to Sky Meadows on the 6^th and I led a hike for them along the McLean Loop on the 13^th.  Both of these were enjoyable.  Conditions for the McLean Loop were especially propitious this time:  the preceding period of dry and relatively warm days created low water levels for the numerous streams that this hike route crosses.  On the 10^th I accompanied the Capital Hiking Club down to the American Chestnut Land Trust, where I had the gratification of seeing several hikers pleased and impressed by a first visit on their part to this area.  But during the latter part of the month such walking that I have done has been urban.  Originally I had planned, as part of my visit to New York, to spend a night in New Jersey and hike a portion of the Appalachian Trail.  But it rained incessantly on the 15^th, the day before I was to arrive in New York; and I had no wish to drive several hours in a rainstorm, or to hike afterwards in an unrelenting downpour.  I returned from New York on the 20^th, and on the 22^nd we had yet another day of continual rain, lasting well into the following morning.  This rainfall was followed by a drop in temperature that went down to the single digits during Friday night and got up only to the teens today.  It actually turned out to be a beautiful day in other respects, but the frigid weather discouraged hikers from signing up for either the CHC or the Wanderbirds hikes that weekend.  Both were therefore canceled. 

At that, our region has been lucky; the storm that caused merely a day of rain here resulted in a considerable amount of snow and sub-zero temperatures in many other parts of the country.  More than a million homes and businesses are without power.  Some parts of New York, close to Lake Erie, may receive as much as three additional feet of snow by nightfall.  More than 200 million people, or around 60% of the U.S. population, are currently under some form of weather warning or advisory.  Air travel has been in a state of confusion.  Nearly 6,000 flights within, into, or out of the United States were canceled and an additional 11,500 were delayed yesterday

The life expectancy of Americans has reached a 25-year low.  Life expectancy for those born in 2019 was 78.8 years.  Life expectancy for people born in the U.S. during 2021 was 76.4 years, the lowest on record since 1996: a drop of 2.4 years in all. The main causes, according to the CDC, are COVID and of the amount of deaths due to substance abuse.  Although COVID has become more controllable, it still remains the third leading cause of death (out-ranked only by heart disease and cancer).  But even though the mortality rate of COVID will continue to decline as both vaccines and therapeutic treatment becomes more sophisticated, substance abuse shows no signs of alleviation.  A study by Johns Hopkins indicated that over 20 million Americans over 12 years of age have substance abuse disorders – about 1 in every 13.  It is not the use of illicit drugs that is the primary factor; the usage rate has remained fairly constant over the years.  But prescription drugs are readily available, and the number of people who get addicted on them is steadily increasing.  Nearly 107,000 Americans died of a drug overdose in 2021.  San Francisco alone saw a 45% increase in drug overdose deaths in a mere two years.

The pretense that COVID is responsible for only a handful of deaths in China is beginning to wear a little thin.  Tesla has suspended production in its busiest facility in Shanghai due to the number of workers calling in sick.  Many other factories have followed suit.  Taiwan is contemplating a restriction on bulk buying of pain relief medications because of the number of people who are buying them to send to their relatives on the mainland.  Reporters from independent organizations such as the Associated Press have seen hospital intensive care units overwhelmed by patients and ambulances being turned away.  Sun Yang, a deputy director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, estimated that some 250 million people in the country have caught COVID-19 in the past three weeks.  Even with a 0.1% mortality rate, such a figure would translate into at least 250,000 deaths.  There are some reports that crematoria are burning 20-to-30 bodies daily and that many have a long waiting list in addition.  Sharply increased numbers of absences from work on account of illness, shortages of fever-reducing medicine, hospitals with no available ICUs, and staff working overtime at crematoria all suggest – to use the mildest term – that the deaths from the virus are widespread. 

There are new developments in the case Dominion Voting Systems has filed against Fox News.  Sean Hannity, one of Trump’s staunchest sycophants minions defenders, said under oath that he never believed the lie that Trump was cheated of victory in the 2020 presidential election.  So did Meade Cooper, Fox News’ executive vice president.  Fox News did have a few partisans of common-sense during Fox News’ campaign to prop up the lie about the “stolen” election, including, rather surprisingly, Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott, who warned her colleagues that “we can’t give the crazies an inch.”  But she was overruled, and Hannity along with many others amplified and embraced Trump’s claims, presenting them to millions of viewers, and slandering Dominion Voting Systems, which collected the ballots, in the process.  The lawsuit will drag out for several months to come.  To win in court, Dominion must demonstrate that Fox stars and decision-makers knew these claims of election fraud were lies, but let them be broadcast anyway, or were negligent in disregarding warning signs.  But these admissions from Hannity and Cooper certainly provide a promising beginning.

And the committee for investing the events of January 6, 2021, has declared that their central cause was “one man” and that Trump carried out “a multipart plan to overturn the 2020 presidential election,”  recommending that Congress consider whether to bar Trump and his allies from holding office in the future under the 14th Amendment’s ban on insurrectionists.  But will the Department of Justice take this tolerably broad hint and indict Trump some two years after the insurrection?  There are undoubtedly some practical considerations that hinder such an undertaking.  In the words of Amy Sorkin of The New York Times:  “Presidents have been impeached, but none has ever been asked, after leaving office, to turn himself in for arraignment, with the prospect of arrest if he failed to comply. No judge has had to consider the question of cash bail for a billionaire who once lived in the White House, or asked the former head of state to turn over his passport. The voir dire of potential jurors would be an unprecedented spectacle; so would the mug shot.”  There is a further complication of time constraints.  If Trump were indicted, he would undoubtedly create delays by raising objections and appeals, all of which take time to resolve; and in the meantime the Republican primary is quickly approaching.  And even if he were indicted and convicted before the upcoming Presidential election in 2024, the next President has the option of pardoning him.

There is one hope:  presidential elections and pardons do not affect state trials.  The special grand jury investigation in Georgia has begun to write up its final report.  If it gives a criminal referral to Donald Trump, State Attorney General Fani Willis could formally charge him.  And if the case comes to trial and the verdict goes against Trump, then there is the possibility that he will get time in jail, perhaps as much as twenty years.  This outcome is greatly to be desired, for no other type of penalty will create as much as a dent in that iron-shelled juggernaut that is Donald Trump.

Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 661,440,225; # of deaths worldwide: 6,685,239; # of cases U.S.:  102,211,153; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,115,933. 

Visit to relatives in New York – Inter-state traveling then and now – Reflections on American education – Incredibly (and I mean that in a literal sense) low COVID rates in China – The investigating committee winds up at last – The enigma of Mike Pence – Oppression of women under the Taliban – Fraudulent pseudo-abortion clinics – Evening statistics

I have just returned from a visit to my aunt in Manhattan; and I was struck, as I could hardly fail to be, by the contrast between arranging this visit and arranging the one two years previously.

Two years ago travel from one state to another was just becoming possible again, following an interdict that lasted for months in order to prevent the COVID virus from spreading.  When I wished to visit my aunt for her 90^th birthday in the summer of 2020, any plans I made to that end had to be flung away and it was not until several months afterwards that I was able to revive them.  Now, of course, there were no obstacles whatever.  National and indeed international travel is completely unrestricted, and the bans placed on traveling from one state to another at this point seem like a bad dream.

Nonetheless COVID still remains with us, and it had a significant impact on the circumstances of my visit.  Originally I had planned to drive all the way to Riverdale to stay with my cousin there.  A car is much less of a liability in the Bronx than in Manhattan, and it would have been easy to park in the neighborhood where he lives.  But this arrangement had to be jettisoned when my cousin’s son came down with COVID and went to his parents’ apartment to recuperate.  So I stayed with my aunt instead and, since she lives in Manhattan, I drove only as far as Princeton Junction and took the train from there to Penn Station.  COVID, to be sure, is less of a threat now than it was two years ago, thanks to the prevalence of the vaccines; the mortality rate is down and detrimental long-term effects are less frequent.  But it remains a plague; even now a patient is more than ten times as likely to succumb to COVID than an influenza patient is to the latter disease.   In the end my young relative left his parents’ residence after staying for a few days, even though he was still testing positive.  But he felt no ill effects at that point and was anxious to return to his own place. 

In general I would say that the residents of New York are more cautious about the disease than the residents of DC.  I used the public transit on a few occasions, and my estimate is that about a quarter of the passengers were wearing facemasks, whereas in DC very few now bother to don one.  In stores, also, a greater number of cashiers and customers were wearing masks – not a majority by any means, but a significantly higher proportion than what I have observed in Washington.

There were several other relatives whom I encountered during this visit.  One of these is the son of my cousin who lives in Chile.  He is staying with my aunt while completing some coursework in New York, but he plans to return eventually to Chile as his permanent homeland.  We were discussing numerous topics last night and among them was the quality of American education.  By his own estimate my young cousin’s mathematical skills are mediocre at best and he openly admits that he has difficulty in balancing a checkbook.  Nonetheless, when taking a remedial mathematics course, he found that the majority of his classmates were woefully ignorant about the subject, unable to do as simple an operation as rounding numbers up or down.  He actually wound up performing the role of an informal assistant to the teacher, to the surprise of both of them.  “The American educational system is failing its students,” was his verdict, and it is difficult to disagree with him.

The mortality rate of COVID appears to be much, much lower in China than it is here.  It seems that only five COVID-related deaths in the entire country occurred today and two yesterday, all of which were in Beijing, meaning that somehow every one of the remaining provinces has miraculously escaped.  We know this must be true, because the Chinese health authorities have said so themselves.  This result is all the more surprising when one takes into account the low vaccination rate of the elderly, with only 42% of those over 80 having received boosters.  For some unexplained reason, though, Chinese funeral homes have been unusually busy lately.  One such service in Beijing’s Shunyi district clandestinely contacted The Washington Post to say that all eight cremators are operating around-the-clock, cadaver freezer boxes are full, and there is a five-to-six-day waiting list.

Yesterday the House January 6 Committee concluded its investigation at last.  It unanimously voted to recommend that Donald Trump be criminally prosecuted, for charges including conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstructing an act of Congress, and, of course, insurrection. 

It’s a step in the right direction, but now it remains for the Department of Justice to take action.  There are certain difficulties in the way.  It could be plausibly argued, for instance, that Trump’s speeches to the rioters never explicitly called for violence and that his instructions for the crowd to “fight” (a word he used about 20-to-25 times) were metaphorical.  If such were the case, prosecution of him would amount to prosecution of freedom of speech. 

But his behavior both before and since provides ample evidence that he was advocating sedition.  One example is his hijacking of thousands of classified documents to his residence at Mar-a-Lago.  As recently as a couple of weeks ago he openly called for defying the Constitution in order to overturn the 2020 election. 

And his support for the rioters went beyond mere words.  When told that magnetometers were keeping members of the crowd away from the stage, Trump ordered them to be removed.  Happily, this order was not obeyed; if it had been, the crowd would have been more heavily armed and physically closer to the members of Congress under siege.  When returning to the White House, Trump ordered that he be driven to the Capitol so he could accompany the crowd, an order that the Secret Service refused to carry out.  For much of the first hour after his return to the White House, Trump kept insisting on being taken to the Capitol. And not only did Trump not intervene for several hours once the violence began, he tweeted, knowing full well that the mob was calling for the hanging of the vice president, that “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution.”

Speaking of Mike Pence, this gentleman has announced that he does not believe that the Department of Justice should arraign Trump.  The rioters had repeatedly called out for Pence’s blood and Trump apparently was only too ready to betray him to them; and yet this besotted man is still attempting to deflect the much-deferred justice awaiting the megalomaniac who would have connived at his murder.  One cannot write Pence off merely as a coward.  During the time of the riot itself he displayed remarkable courage.  He turned down the offers of the Secret Service personnel to escort him to safety in order to ensure that the process of ratifying the election could be completed.  Indeed, the outcome of the election would have been greatly delayed and possibly would have led to numerous other altercations if it had not been for the firmness and rectitude he showed on that occasion.  Pence’s consistent refusal to call Trump to account for his actions reflects weakness of a different nature than simple cowardice, one whose motivation is well beyond my powers of comprehension.  But it is weakness nonetheless.

Women are now prohibited from seeking college education in Afghanistan.  The Taliban initially promised to institute a more moderate rule respecting rights for women’s and minorities, and they then proceeded to do what all religious zealots do:  they lied through their teeth.  Girls are now banned from middle school and high school, while adult women are restricted from most employment and ordered to wear head-to-toe clothing in public. Women are also banned from parks and gyms.  “Is being a girl a crime? If that’s the case, I wish I wasn’t a girl,” one student said mournfully.

Since our home-grown zealots do not possess quite the level of power assumed by the Taliban – not for lack of trying, it may be added; but this is merely by the way – our holier-than-thou types, I say, in addition to their efforts to ban abortion on a state-by-state basis, have stooped to downright fraud in their effects to discourage women from terminating their pregnancies.  The experience of Estefania (her last name was withheld at her request) is typical.  She was apprehensive that she might be pregnant after a missed period, so she typed “abortion pill near me” into Google and went to the first clinic that came up on the web page.  What she wandered into was not an abortion clinic but a “crisis pregnancy center” (or CPC for short), whose express purpose is to dissuade women from having abortions.  CPCs outnumber abortion clinics by a factor of three-to-one. Some are deliberately placed near abortion clinics, and use names and building signs nearly identical to these clinics to create confusion. Many of them also use multiple names to conceal their religious agenda.  The Keim Centers, which Estefania consulted, is run by a non-profit called the Crisis Pregnancy Center of Tidewater, whose website openly proclaims the organization’s anti-abortion and religious views.  But the Keim Centers itself does not make any religious references, so Estefania had no idea why the nurse she consulted was repeatedly pressuring her to forego the abortion she expressly came to obtain or why the center refused to give her a referral to an abortion provider.  CPCs are not required to be licensed or to answer to any state or federal regulatory bodies.  California tried to get CPCs to disclose whether or not they were medically licensed, but the Supreme Court struck down that law.  Many people who work at CPCs do not have medical degrees or experience, which does not prevent them from dispensing medical advice.  Such was Estefanía’s experience at The Keim Centers, which she said “scared” her. She was given a pamphlet that claimed abortions could cause breast cancer (they do not). Her counselor also told her that if she had a medical abortion, she might see little hands or little feet during the process – another false claim, as Estefanía was only four weeks pregnant at the time.  She eventually managed to end her pregnancy, but she was one of the lucky ones.  Women who are tricked into coming into CPCs for consultation are frequently delayed by being kept at their centers for hours or scheduling follow-up appointments. By the time women manage to make an appointment at a real clinic, the procedure could become more costly or difficult – or, indeed, in several states, past the time limits that abortions are legally permitted.

Today’s statistics as of 9:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 658,820,448; # of deaths worldwide: 6,675,451; # of cases U.S.:  101,865,927; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,113,808. 

What we can get used to:  rising COVID rates, overseas oppression, Russo-Ukrainian war, Trumpian sedition – Our senescent Senate – The stoned monks – Elon Musk’s reception on stage – Evening statistics

Nearly two weeks since the last journal entry, and the cause of such a gap is not so much on account of lack of news but as to what we (or at any rate I) have gotten hardened to over recent months.  For example, the number of COVID cases is steadily rising, along with those of other respiratory diseases such as influenza and RSV, and hospitals are already reporting shortages, both of staff and supplies.  But we are used to rises in respiratory diseases and strains on our hospital system during the winter months.  At this point a rise in COVID cases is no longer news, any more than that of a rise of the level of other respiratory diseases that have been on the scene many years longer.

Then again, the populaces of countries taken over a radical fringe movement, such as Afghanistan and Myanmar, continue to languish under their tyrannous administrations, while the Iranian government cold-bloodedly shoots down demonstrators and executes dissidents with cheerful abandon; and that, too, has become a familiar factor on the international scene that no one thinks of questioning.  Considerable indignation was expressed initially during the takeovers of both Myanmar and Afghanistan, but they excite no more comment now than does the passing of autumn into winter; indeed, on the day of the solstice I anticipate that it will provoke considerably less.

And the peace that once prevailed in Europe for several decades has been broken for nearly a year now by the Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.  The other European nations are somewhat less apathetic on this point than on the others already mentioned, realizing that Ukraine’s fate today could be theirs tomorrow.  But the basic situation remains unchanged:  Putin continues to besiege Ukraine with bombings and armed forces, and he is too firmly entrenched in power to be dislodged.  He appears likely to wage war for years to come.

Again, Donald Trump at one point called for termination of the Constitution to overturn the 2020 election and reinstate him to power.  In effect, he has declared his determination to be this country’s dictator.  And that, too, we have gotten accustomed to.  Even the Democrats barely remarked on it.  As to any hope that our judicial system will impose genuinely substantive penalties for his continual sedition, I give it up as lost.  The Trump Organization has lately been found guilty of tax fraud, but the potential fine is at most $1.6 million, a pittance for someone of Trump’s assets; and in any case he was not directly indicted.  If the Trump Organization were to flounder altogether it would not damage his political standing in the least.  Here, for example, is an excerpt from an analysis by CNN reporter Stephen Collinson:

 “The Justice Department’s success in removing Trump’s legal obstacles to its investigations may also be moving the country toward the resolution of one of the most fateful questions haunting any modern political campaign: Will an ex-president who is running for the White House again, and has a history of inciting violence to further his anti-democratic ends, face criminal charges?”

The question should not be “will an ex-president face criminal charges?” but “when will he face charges?”  The answer, it appears, is never.  The so-called investigative committee has spent months assembling evidence – at any rate, it has claimed to do so – and pundit after pundit has spoken of the grave reckoning that is in store for him.  But it simply does not materialize. 

There are other factors in our political system that appear to be fixtures as well:

“They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld; and the women more horrible than the men. Besides the usual deformities in extreme old age, they acquired an additional ghastliness, in proportion to their number of years, which is not to be described; and among half a dozen, I soon distinguished which was the eldest, although there was not above a century or two between them.”

Jonathan Swift, in Gulliver’s Travels, is here depicting the struldbrugs, who can never die but who age continually.  But, with an uncanny prescience, he could have been describing the American Senate – for instance, Chuck Grassley of Indiana, who is running for re-election even though he is 88 years old.   Come to think of it, the prospective candidates for the upcoming Presidential election are not exactly spring chickens.  It appears that an alternative has been provided for Democrats who might balk at nominating Biden for the 2024 Presidential campaign.  If Biden decides that he will not, after all, run for office 2024, then Bernie Sanders has declared his intention to run in Biden’s stead; and in contrast to Biden’s 80 years Sanders is  . . . 81.

If this is the best that the Democratic Party can do, it is no wonder that some people still see Trump as a viable candidate.  At a mere 76 years of age, he is a callow youth in comparison with the alternatives being offered. 

Religion may be the opium of the people, but some are inclined to have both of them simultaneously.  Four monks, as well as the abbot, at a temple in Phetchabun province’s Bung Sam Phan district, tested positive for methamphetamine last week.  The monks were immediately defrocked and taken to a local dedication and health center to receive rehabilitation therapy.  The temple now remains without monks, although new ones will be sent to the temple eventually.  Thailand’s infamous Golden Triangle – a tri-junction at the Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand borders – is a hub for drug trafficking and inter-border smuggling.  Methamphetamine pills are common street and party drugs in the nation, readily obtainable and quite inexpensive, even by Thai standards.  This is not the first time that Thai monks have displayed signs of drug addiction. On November 16^th, Phra Annipalo, a monk who got high on amphetamine, was arrested in northern Thailand after carjacking two vehicles and leading policemen on a frantic chase.  He expressed profound contrition afterwards.  Rumor has it that he was indeed very distraught for failing to obtain a bargain because he did not verify what the going rate was first and paid without question the exorbitant price the drug dealer asked for.  His abbot, a holy man, assured him that under the circumstances Heaven would pardon the neglect.

“Ladies and gentlemen, make some noise for the richest man in the world,” Dave Chappelle cried out on stage at the Chase Center in San Francisco as he invited Elon Musk out to join him on Sunday night.  

And they did.  A chorus of boos emerged from the audience, becoming louder and louder, and lasting well over five minutes, taking both Musk and Chappelle completely by surprise.  What perhaps is truly surprising is that Musk, from the attitude he presented during his stage entrance, was visibly preening, evidently ready to receive paeans of praise.  Why he imagined he could be popular in a city that perhaps is the one most affected in the entire country by the numerous layoffs after his takeover of Twitter is something of a mystery.  Musk attempted afterwards to assure his followers on Twitter that the noise had been “90% cheers and 10% boos” but the footage tells a different story.  James Wu, a witness of the event, summed it all up: “A good 80% of the stadium boos. 18k people, and he withers. Like absolutely turns into a corncob.”  Incidentally, this account of the matter was posted on the Web via a tweet on Twitter.

Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 654,057,226; # of deaths worldwide: 6,659,954; # of cases U.S.:  101,368,712; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,109,981.