November 8, 2022
Letter from the Vineyard
Election Day Musings
This past weekend, the sun shone bright, the wind was soft, the temperatures near 70; it seemed as if mid-September had made an island return. Leaves are turning everywhere, it seems. In my yard, green still rules.
The streets of Edgartown are quiet, many businesses shuttered for the season, signs in windows thanking people for a great season, see you next year.
At this moment, next year seems faraway though it’s not; it will be here before we have finished resting from this one.
We still have Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Christmas in Edgartown, Christmas itself, New Year’s, all ahead of us before the sublime quiet of January, when the Vineyard goes to rest, everything seemingly folding into itself, the days short in every sense. The bookstore is open from 10 to 5, almost not working at all it feels, thinking back on the twelve + hour days worked back in the 80’s, 90’s and the aughts.
I was younger then.
As I write, Chopin plays. He has become my composer of choice for quiet, contemplative moments, of which there are many these days.
Today, November 8th, is election day, the dreaded mid-terms – generally, a referendum on whoever is currently sitting in the White House though this is such a mixed year who knows where it will go. Roe v Wade has been overturned and many, many are unhappy.
Despite his uncharismatic persona, Joe Biden has actually done a decent job but the collateral damage of the pandemic, with its disruptions of all kinds to the supply chain, which he can’t fix overnight, the war in Ukraine [kudos to Biden and team for pulling the NATO alliance together to back that poor country] has caused a global food crisis as Ukraine supplies a huge amount of grain to the world and as the war is wreaking havoc with energy supplies, weaponized by Putin. China’s zero covid policy has shuttered plants; the world’s manufacturer has slowed deliveries of everything from computer chips to toys.
Inflation has resulted. Biden’s being blamed. The supply chain crisis began under Trump, who takes no responsibility for anything, anytime.
Chopin is playing because I am frightened. If the Republicans win, we are in for a world of trouble, IMHO [in my humble opinion], as I have no idea what any of these people stand for except more NO.
Unless I have missed it, I don’t hear any constructive Republican plans to tackle inflation – it’s all about how Biden has not succeeded in taming it, which he can’t. That’s the Federal Reserve’s job and they’re doing what they do, raising interest rates, which may, may not, lead to a recession.
Most people have forgotten the days when interest rates for mortgages were higher than now. I do. The first home I owned had an interest rate of 10.75%; my mortgage broker said it was the lowest she had closed in three weeks. That was 1985.
Lots of folks have been born since then, not remembering those difficult, brittle days in the much-glorified presidency of Ronald Reagan, whose trickledown economics have been slavishly followed by Republicans since then, to no good end. It’s a failed policy. Period.
Today is Election Day and will likely herald in a time of discord – at least a hundred Republicans running for office have not committed to accepting the results of the election. Half the Republican candidates are election deniers.
It will take weeks to count some of the mail-in ballots, particularly in states that have prevented them from being counted prior to today.
Republicans are steering themselves away from the center, driving hard to the right, lionizing Viktor Orban of Hungary, dictator in all but name, who calls for “Christian Democracy.” Marjorie Taylor Greene swooned over the election of the rightist Meloni in Italy. Wisconsin has been gerrymandered to the Republicans.
Trump will probably announce his re-election campaign any day now, as much, in all likelihood, to make his growing legal issues more difficult to pursue by law officials. Mr. Trump has underscored his feud with Governor “De Sanctimonious.”
We are all but guaranteed a h*ll of a ride between now and 2024.
A crazed man mired in crazy conspiracy theories broke into the home of Nancy Pelosi, using a hammer on her husband’s head while asking where she was, threatening to break her kneecaps.
Some Republicans, shamelessly, attempted to blame it on a lover’s quarrel, or a male prostitute trick gone bad.
Democrats can’t find a clear message to save their souls and Biden, poor chap, is no Obama or Kennedy in the eloquence category, nor is he a Clinton, who tripped himself up and out of being remembered as well as he should be.
Alas, Babylon.
We are facing a tough time, folks. Pray. Hard.
Letter from the Vineyard 