We are still a long way from fully hoisting the responsibilities the pandemic has laid on our shoulders. For many reasons, the American reaction to the virus has been appallingly uneven and unsteady. Collectively and individually, we are nowhere near adopting a wise course of action in the lengthening crisis which has descended upon us.

If it is declared that the president loses the election by any margin, he will reject the outcome. Even if Joe Biden wins the popular vote by at least a ten-point margin, the president will reject his loss. If it is widely concluded that either the popular or Electoral College vote is perceived to be too close to determine a winner, both presidential candidates may refuse to accept the final tally.

It is the woman, and only the woman, who has the right and the responsibility to choose whether to continue or discontinue a pregnancy. In the past, too many males have passed laws or laid down edicts governing the bodies of too many females. Too many male clergy have thundered their easy opposition to abortion, too easily dismissing the profound issues that pregnant women must always face alone. It is morally and legally repugnant to prevent women from making that choice.

If it is proper to call the Democratic Party the “Democrat Party,” then it is proper to call the Republican Party the “Republic Party.” However, it is improper to shorten the nomenclature of either party. The words Democratic and Republican, when affixed to the two major American political conglomerates, are adjectives with significant historical meaning; they are not nouns. They become nouns only when joined to the word Party.

From the beginning of the worldwide outbreak of the coronavirus, the USA has had the worst record of any nation in combating the pandemic. We have had a quarter of the world’s cases, and a quarter of the world’s deaths, but we have only 4% of the world’s population. How is this possible?

Do unstable leaders lead to instability? The answer to that question would appear to be and unqualified Yes. Unstable leaders inevitably lead to at least some measure of instability. If a person in power is erratic or totally unpredictable or certifiably daft (to use an excellent Scottish word), is it to be expected that instability shall result from that leader’s leadership, or lack thereof. There may be exceptions to this supposition, but historically I suspect not too many.

Apropos of nothing in particular, a thought occurred to me yesterday. What would have happened if the thirteen American colonies had failed to win their independence from Britain? Obviously by its very nature that is an entirely hypothetical and speculative question. But, for the sake of discussion, where would “Americans” be now if we were like a Canada, but with ten times the population?

It is, I am convinced, a useful and wise exercise to contemplate one’s demise, if only because our demise is inevitable. COVID-19, the Coronavirus Identified in 2019, has kindled my lifelong death-obsession as has nothing in prior times. I wonder: Is that cough the cough? I cough several times each morning, clearing out the phlegm-accumulation from lying all night with an involuntarily opened mouth, but is this an unprecedented and distinctly unwelcome hack? There is a stiffness in my bones; is it simply advanced chronology, or is it COVID? My chest seems unusually constricted; has the tiny red fuzzy sphere with the even tinier golf tees sticking up at all angles seized me in its miniscule grip?

History has always had a bumpy evolution. We might suppose that once events are far enough behind us they officially become history. They do, but the interpretation of what they mean can change quickly and dramatically. Thus history is not rigid. Rather it is fluid. It ebbs and flows, depending on the changing outlooks of all those who are doing the historical interpretation.

Nationalistic impulses always divide and threaten Planet Earth. We need a return to a much larger and more cohesive world, to Mega-Earth. T-shirt or cap makers might create some new products to do their small part to strengthen the international economy --- MEGA: Make Earth Great Again.

Globalization might be very briefly described in two words as “economic internationalism.” That is, it is the intentional expansion of international corporations into underdeveloped countries, especially in Africa, Asia, and Latin America for both manufacturing and sales. If Amazon, Huawei, Bombardier, Embraer, BMW, Foxcomm, Airbus, British Leyland, and other such corporations can build plants in places like Mexico, Ghana, Ethiopia, India, Ecuador, and Indonesia, and then sell their products anywhere in the world with low or no tariffs, it is presumably a win-win for everyone.

Biographers and historians benefit tremendously from the advantage of hindsight. Always they write about people and events that happened in the past, and about which relatively many things were previously written. History is the record of purported facts plus many opinions and prejudices about the lives of historical personages. It has always been that way, and it cannot be possibly be otherwise.

Biographers and historians benefit tremendously from the advantage of hindsight. Always they write about people and events that happened in the past, and about which relatively many things were previously written. History is the record of purported facts plus many opinions and prejudices about the lives of historical personages. It has always been that way, and it cannot be possibly be otherwise.

Without ideas, ideals, and idealism, human history would never have progressed. As Robert Browning insisted, “A man’s reach must exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?” Nevertheless, we humans can invest too much in our ideas, ideals, and idealisms. Thus they can transmogrify into immoveable and unbending ideologies.

The news media have almost exclusively devoted themselves to COVID-19 for the past five months, but especially in the past three months. What are the facts about this virus at this point, and what are merely opinions? Are the experts telling us what they know, or is it only what they think? What are the facts about what is happening, and what instead are interpretations of what is happening, but still with no possible possession of all the facts?

Out of the past nine American presidents, it is my opinion that Richard Nixon had the strongest inherent political interest in and commitment to foreign policy. However, in other areas of his shortened presidency, he had one or two major deficiencies, as you may recall if you are sufficiently sapient to recall such things. Still, no one in the past fifty years has displayed more concern for the place of the USA in the world order via foreign policy than Nixon.

We delude ourselves about war, too often concluding that it is a political and moral necessity. And even if it were necessary (which it never is), it is always a necessary evil.

All gargantuan human achievements are inevitably beset by gargantuan problems, setbacks, and huge financial overruns. It cannot be otherwise. The building of the American transcontinental railroad and NASA’s success in sending the first manned mission to the moon are outstanding examples of this phenomenon. Coincidentally, they happened to transpire almost exactly one hundred years apart from one another.

Political parties have one of the most important roles in every democracy. It is their duty to lead the people into doing what ought to happen rather to follow the wishes of what a majority of the people want to happen.

David Leonhardt of The New York Times recently wrote a very important editorial. He pointed out that prior to the pandemic, because of declining advertising revenue, local newspapers had already lost 25% of their journalistic staff. Now, because of worsening ad revenue due to the lockdown, Leonhardt said that up to 50% of the writers are gone. He is greatly concerned about that decline, and so also should be every American citizen. As Mr. Leonhardt stated, voters are less likely to go the polls if they do not have a local print newspaper to help select candidates for whom to vote. When fewer people go to the polls, corruption and polarization are far more likely to occur, he said.