Hiking in Fort Duncan and along the Maryland AT – To run or not to run: that is the question – Biden in Kyiv – Evening statistics
The unusually warm winter weather continues, albeit fitfully. It was rather cool on Monday, but clear for the most part, enabling a few of us to hike in the Fort Duncan area. The hike consists of bushwhacking for the most part, but at this season the undergrowth was not especially troublesome and the glimpses of the past, both at the earthern parapet of the fort and of the limonite mine, which provides the sensation of a slot canyon when walking between its walls, are well worth the effort. Of course the views thus obtained are somewhat misleading, for the foothills in this area were almost completely denuded of tress during the middle of the 19th century, when the fort and the mine were established; and now they are covered with forest, with oaks rearing to great heights. It is startling to realize how great a change has occurred in little more than a century.
Yesterday I went with the Vigorous Hikers on the Appalachian Trail from Weverton Cliffs to the pedestrian bridge over I-70, a distance of about 19 miles, with over 3500 of elevation gain. It was sunny during the first part of the hike, but the clouds gathered over us and rain began to patter when we lunched at White Rock. I was somewhat apprehensive about the section to follow, for White Rock is close to the completion of the ascent of Lambs Knoll from the south, and the descent from that summit to the Reno Monument is long, steep, and rocky. Happily it was only a light sprinkle that did not make the rocks unduly slippery. This section of the AT tends to get short shrift from devotees of the trail. It is, to be sure, not spectacular, but there are several views along the way both of the Hagerstown Valley to the west and the Catoctins to the east, and the various ups and downs amount to no trivial effort. We completed the hike in six hours, including the break we took for lunch, which is a very reasonable pace.
There is some doubt after all about whether Biden will run for re-election. He has made no specific declaration and he shows no eagerness to begin campaigning. Most of his daily activities are focused on the Presidential job itself, rather than preparing to undergo another four years of it. But because he has made no definite indication one way or another, the Democratic Party is currently in a flurry of indecision. Its members do not wish to undermine Biden’s campaign if he does decide to run; but they also want to start focusing on viable candidates if he does not – assuming, that is, if they can find any.
Biden has recently shown a degree of decisiveness not usual in him, when he strode with Ukraine’s Zelensky along the streets of war-besieged Kyiv and then, after Putin delivered a rambling but belligerent speech about the decadent West, giving a speech of his own denouncing Putin as a tyrant and a dictator. Overall he displayed a surprising optimism about the war, even to the extent of speaking at times as if it were already over, with Ukraine as the victor. The war, after all, has already claimed about 300,000 lives and Russia remains in occupancy of 20% of Ukraine’s territory; so a declaration of victory seems a trifle premature. Still, Biden’s presence in Kyiv and his resolute attack on Putin afterward is a welcome change from the vacillation and irresolution that has characterized so much of his administration.
I continue to post statistics about COVID cases and deaths from . . . sheer cussedness, perhaps. It is becoming clear that reliable data in many instances is impossible to obtain. For example, the death toll from the recent wave of the disease in China is officially 83,150 people as of Feb. 9. This figure is clearly an undercount, not the least because it reflects only those who died in hospitals instead of in their own homes. In addition, deaths from liver, kidney or cardiac failure were also excluded, even when COVID was the obvious cause. The recent wave of COVID may actually have killed between 1 million and 1½ million. Even at that, the death rate is lower than that of countries such as the U.S., Germany, Italy, etc., where the disease ran rampant before vaccines were available.
With this caveat, today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 679,079,043; # of deaths worldwide: 6,793,825; # of cases U.S.: 105,053,586; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,143,368.