We have been waiting four long years for this day to arrive. Frankly, I am so nervous about the whole thing that I had trouble sleeping last night (as I knew I would). Good thing I have today and tomorrow off from work.
Tag: elections
Today in History – the PTBT. Plus commentary on current events.
Today, October 7th, is the 57th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy signing the Partial Test Ban Treaty, officially known as the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space, and Under Water.
Considering how dangerously close we had gotten to World War III during the Cuban Missile Crisis the previous October, this treaty was a long step towards a permanent solution to the dangers of nuclear war. I am old enough to remember the last few times we really had to worry about nuclear war, like back in 1983. That was the year the TV movie “The Day After” came out, and also happened to be the year we had a couple of close calls of which the American public was blissfully unaware.
Continue reading “Today in History – the PTBT. Plus commentary on current events.”
I have to vote for Joe. So do you.
Joe Biden was not my first choice as the Democratic Presidential Nominee. He wasn’t even on the list to be honest. But I will vote for him and Kamala Harris on or before November 3rd with my last breath if necessary. Anyone who is a registered voter in the US who does otherwise is a fool.
There have been a lot of people writing think pieces both before and now after the DNC about how Joe is reaching the “middle of the party” and Kamala is reaching out to the “Black vote” and how that “will heal the party”. I’m also personally seeing a LOT of folks on twitter and elsewhere who are angry. They’re angry that out of a field of Democratic candidates that included LGBTQ and BIPOC candidates for the top of the ticket we ended up with yet another old white guy.
I get that. And yet I’m still going to do whatever I have to in order to make sure that my vote for Biden/Harris is counted for November 3rd. This isn’t quite a hold my nose a vote situation, but it isn’t far off.
Here’s the thing, our country is literally and figuratively on fire right now. We’ve got nearly 200,000 dead of COVID-19, a number that could have been So. Much. Smaller. had we a competent administration in office. And that number, which is likely wildly low thanks to intentional failures of reporting in lots of states, doesn’t including “unrelated” but absolutely caused by COVID deaths such as suicides, domestic violence, overdoses, and the like.
Millions are out of work, the rights of humans all across this country are being stripped away in myriad ways, people are marching in the streets to try and, as I saw someone say the other day, “Legalize Blackness” and yet actual Nazis walk free in this land that fought to bring down the Third Reich. We have white supremacists and Nazis in our highest offices in the government and they’re enriching themselves and their billionaire friends at unprecedented rates all at the cost of the rest of us.
And yet I hear people saying that they won’t vote for Biden/Harris because, “she’s a cop” “he’s a white man” “he wasn’t my top choice” “I would have preferred X” “I can’t vote for someone who put black people in jail” etc, etc.
Here’s the thing. Biden/Harris are not gonna save us, they’re not gonna fix it all. No administration in the history of ever has done that. Not in one term, not in two, not in three.
But another term with Trump will kill us. That’s a fact.
And sitting in a position where you put your personal distaste of Biden or Harris over the good of this nation is a position of extreme privilege. If we expect the Republicans to put country over party then we should expect the same of ourselves, especially right now.
I want ranked choice voting. I want more than 2 parties. I wish it wasn’t this way. But right now, this is how it is. Right now, is not the time to try and make those things happen. Right now we’re voting for our very survival. We’re voting for our lives.
People are dying. If you don’t know someone who has died of or been ill with COVID, just wait. You will. And another 4 years of looting the American public, deaths en mass, and a destroyed government infrastructure is going to be the least of our worries if Trump isn’t beaten in a landslide.
Trump and his cabal are the greatest danger to our country, to each of us individually, and to the world any of us has seen in our lifetime. Every vote for anyone other than Biden/Harris is a vote for Trump. Hold your nose and and do your job as a citizen of this Republic and vote to save it.
Then, let’s get to work on fixing it.
Kelly
Lily Tomlin was right. No matter how cynical you get, it’s impossible to keep up.
Well. It has been a long time since I have posted anything political. And that is because frankly, it has been just too depressing a topic to really talk about lately, particularly when I try to put it all in historical perspective, which is what I do – after all, I am a historian.
Not to be too dramatic, but I am really, really worried.
Continue reading “Lily Tomlin was right. No matter how cynical you get, it’s impossible to keep up.”
2016 just can’t end fast enough
Well. Where to begin.
Yes, 2016 has not been a great year for all sorts of reasons. In that sense. John Oliver is right (see below, and definitely not safe for work).
We can’t wait for it to be over either.
Yes, there have been some good things that happened this year. Kelly and I finally have a house of our own, and we love it. Just this past weekend we put up our Christmas tree for the first time in several years. I was smiling from ear to ear. I just couldn’t help myself. As silly as it might seem to some people, putting up the tree in our living room as we listened to Christmas music was one of the most serene and happy moments I have had in a long, long time. It meant the world to me.
Also, there was the addition of little Violet to our family a few weeks after we moved to Winthrop, and we love her very much. She is an absolutely sweet and affectionate little thing and we could not have hoped for a better addition to our little family. She has found all sorts of little places around the house to sleep, and one of my favorite things to do around the new house is to find the new places where she has decided to sit and/or nap.
We spent our Thanksgiving day in New Hampshire at my sister Liz’s house, after picking up my Aunt Donna from her place (also in NH now) and heading over to have Thanksgiving as a late lunch. And we had a pretty good time, all things considered. Luckily, we managed to avoid all discussions of politics.
So yes, while I can’t avoid discussing politics forever, I am going to put off talking about it for a little because I wanted to end this post on a positive note. While I have much to see about current events I will still try to put up some more pictures of the new place, as well as some pictures of all of our furry “kids” together. It is the season for that sort of thing.
Much love to all our family, friends and acquaintances.
-Geoff
More thoughts on this historic election day: part two
Bear with me, because this post is a LOT longer. I just have too much of a need to vent.
After I picked Kelly up from work, we pahked the cah in our driveway and walked (in my case, limped/hobbled) down to our polling place here in Winthrop. We had never been there before, but luckily it was even closer than we thought it was. There was a line, but it wasn’t that bad, and we were fortunate in that we got through the line and voted pretty quickly. I know other people around the greater Boston area (and around the country, for that matter) had to wait for hours. So we walked home and I made some dinner so we could settle in for the evening and watch the returns.
Continue reading “More thoughts on this historic election day: part two”
Some thoughts on this historic election day, part one
Yes, historic. No, I am not being overly dramatic.
I have plenty to say, but as an introduction I want all of you to hear what Samantha Bee has to say because she puts it in its proper perspective and frankly, it’s something I think we all need to hear.
She’s right. As Kelly pointed out on our Twitter feed earlier today, a lot of people (particularly women) see this election in its proper context as (quite probably*) the first election of a woman to the office of President of the United States. And that is absolutely HUGE.
More to follow soon, I promise.
-Geoff
*Unless this turns into another too-close-to-call nail biter like 2000, we’ll probably know soon enough, won’t we?
Dear Benioff and Weiss… WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!?!?
OK guys, I get it. George just hasn’t been able to crank out the books fast enough, and now the TV show has caught up to the books, more or less. So now you no longer have all that juicy source material to work from, you just have whatever tidbits GRRM has given you about where the story is going. That’s fine.
But guys? I’m worried. Frankly, you are starting to scare me a little bit. Not having Book Six or Book Seven to work from does not mean that you should suddenly become nihilists. It’s not a race to see who can kill more characters. Moving the story forward does not mean taking a large metaphorical dump on the hopes and dreams of the fans, ok?
Continue reading “Dear Benioff and Weiss… WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!?!?”
Donald Trump is more of a symptom than the cause of our political mess
I don’t like to talk about politics too much on our blog, because frankly I need more positivity in my life, and these days it is really difficult to find anything whatsoever in politics that gives me cause for optimism. Still, I am a historian, and I can’t help but think that we are currently experiencing one of those watershed Presidential elections, like the election of 1860 or the election of 1932 or the election of 1968, in which those of us who experience it will talk about in terms of what things were like before, and what they were like after.
Continue reading “Donald Trump is more of a symptom than the cause of our political mess”
Feminism, The Body Politic, and Picking a President
Anybody following this interminable election cycle has probably seen the mud slinging, the by turns insane, hilarious, and terrifying GOP debates, and the charges back and forth in the Democratic camp of “Feminists vote for Hillary” or “You’re not a feminist if you Feel the Bern” etc.
As anyone who reads this blog regularly knows, neither of us is going to vote for anyone with an R after their name, especially in this current bunch of lunatics. There is no lesser of two evils here, there’s just psychopathy, sociopathy, delusions of grandeur, pathological lies, hate, and stupidity. And that’s just Trump.
Continue reading “Feminism, The Body Politic, and Picking a President”
The Books are Taking Over... 