Judgement Day

The View from the Middle

 

Historians will judge this country’s leaders for years to come.  As George W. Bush often points out, historians are still judging George Washington’s administration as well as his, which actually seems to be viewed more favorably as time goes on.  History will also judge Donald Trump’s Presidency for years to come.  They will consider his accomplishments on the economy, his handling of China and the development of the coronavirus vaccine through Operation Warp Speed.  They will balance that with the stumbles in his rhetoric, his indelicate handling of criticism and his lack of a political countenance.  In 10, 20 or 30 years we will get an idea of where historians will rank this President against his peers outside of the emotional fog of today’s fractured society.

But Donald Trump will not be the only person being judged by history.  Nancy Pelosi will also be analyzed.  Nancy will be remembered as the Impeachment queen for her weaponization and trivialization of that process.  Her abuse of that provision would have James Madison (the Father of our Constitution) rolling over in his grave.  Her members began talking about the impeachment of Donald Trump even before he was inaugurated.  Before she started her first impeachment against the President she boldly stated that she was against impeachment, “unless there’s something so compelling and bipartisan” because it is so divisive to the country.  Yet, that impeachment vote was totally partisan with the exception that two Democrats voted with the Republicans against her articles.

But Nancy wanted the record, so she rammed through another impeachment in just seven days.  She didn’t have time for silly things like witnesses and evidence and investigations or even due process for the President.  What we got instead was one day of emotionally charged and highly partisan rhetoric on both sides of the aisle, which is the perfect environment for irrational thinking and poor decisions.  In fact, since the impeachment vote, evidence has surfaced that suggests that these riots were planned days before the President’s speech, thus were not inspired by it.  There is also evidence that the Capitol Building was ill prepared for this event despite the warnings.  But of course, Nancy didn’t have time and didn’t want actual evidence to be introduced to clear up the fog of anger and hate.  And now she is going to ask the Senate to have a trial to remove a man from office who will already be gone.  Certainly, this all plays well into Joe Biden’s inaugural slogan – America United.  I hope you know when I’m being facetious.

Nancy has also demonstrated that she is absolutely oblivious to the real condition of average Americans and even has disdain for them.  Who can forget her “freezers full of ultra-premium ice cream” as a solution to the problems caused by the economic shutdowns across the country.  When people are struggling to put bread on the table, her solution is “Let them eat ice cream”.  Her disdain for her common man manifested itself in the political games she played with the Coronavirus relief bill.  She delayed that badly needed assistance for over six months because (as she admitted later) she didn’t want to give President Trump a political victory.  Her elitist mindset and contempt for the common person in America will certainly have a negative impact on her legacy.

The media has its own historians who have already labeled our current version the most corrupt and or inept in our history.  I will admit that Donald Trump deserved some criticism during his Presidency, and I have given it to him when appropriate.  Whether you like Donald Trump or not, however, you must admit that he did some very positive things.  His administration delivered a roaring economy growing at levels the previous administration said was impossible without a “magic wand”.  That economy delivered historic low levels of unemployment, especially for minorities and women, and real wage growth for the first time in over ten years.  How could a President delivering those results receive 93% negative reporting from what I have called the lame-stream media.

Also, in 1918, the media under reported and even lied about the severity of the Spanish Flu that lead to about 700,000 deaths in America, the equivalent of over two million deaths today, as historian John Barry points out in his book The Great Influenza.  Today’s media coverage of the coronavirus pandemic errors in the opposite direction but will lead to equally catastrophic results.  A poll done in late July of this year found that Americans believed that 9% of our citizenry had already died of Covid-19.  That would be 30 MILLION deaths, and I lay this misperception at the foot of a bias, incurious and even corrupt media.  The negative long-term effects of our mitigation efforts are becoming clear, and as a result, mayors and governors around the country are now, suddenly, wanting to open up their economies.  At the absolute height of infection rates and deaths in this country Governor Cuomo is now desperate to open up New York’s businesses.  Lori Lightfoot, mayor of Chicago, is following Cuomo’s lead and now wants to open up the bars and restaurants in her city.  She in fact says, “They are going to be one of the safer places” to be.  

There is much evidence now that this pandemic has been poorly covered by the press.  Death rates were exaggerated by Dr. Fauci from the very beginning.  The actual death count has been bloated, according to Dr. Deborah Birx, by a faulty methodology that includes a gunshot to the head as a Covid death if the victim tests positive in the morgue.  But is the Media diving into these stories?  No!  Is it bias or ineptitude?  I guess it really doesn’t matter.  Both answers are an indictment of our lame-stream media.  

I’ve never said that this pandemic is not serious.  I have said, however, that our arrogant belief that we could totally control it was always an illusion.  We should have taken common sense precautions to mitigate its spread (like washing your hands and staying home when you are sick) but we should not have shut down our country since that will have a devastating impact on our nation’s economy and education system for years to come.  The prejudice and or incompetence of our media has aided in this deception.  Their dishonesty or ineptitude has truly made the cure worse than the disease.

Finally, Big Tech will be judged.  The bible says, “The last shall be first”, and so it is with Big Tech.  While they are the last to be mentioned in this article and maybe the last to show their Orwellian faces, they will be the first to be judged.  Their targeted blocking of Conservative voices is a clear violation of our first amendment and their brazen collusion against their competitors is an obvious violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act.  

These tech giants have been using Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act to shield themselves from litigation.  What they will find is that Congress cannot create any law that enables them or any of their users to violate the Constitutional rights of any citizen in this country.  I don’t know if it will be Donald Trump or Parler, the new competitor to Twitter, or one of the thousands of conservative voices currently being silenced by Jack Dorsey (Twitter), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), and Sundar Pichai (Google), but one of these cases will make its way to the Supreme Court and I see no defense for Big Tech’s actions.