With all the recent talk of “trusting the experts” it’s easy to forget that the best barometer of how things are faring is almost always ourselves. After all, we don’t need a federal jobs report to tell us our neighbor no longer has a small business; we don’t need to read a newspaper to tell us our parents are ill-protected in their nursing homes; and we sure don’t need mental health professionals to inform us that our children are psychologically breaking down.
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The inauguration of Joseph R. Biden Jr. as the 46th president returns the United States to the direction from whence it came. For the tens of millions who voted for him, his ascendance to the White House means the nation is getting back on track. Those who did not dread the U-turn he has vowed to make.
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The holidays traditionally place a strain on the budgets of many Americans, and the sporadic COVID-19 lockdowns throughout 2020 have only added to the struggle to make ends meet. As if those financial challenges were not enough, Joe Biden has more in store. Change is hard, to coin a phrase, and the kind of "clean energy revolution" he has in mind is likely to cost a pretty penny.
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Speak one's mind is an abiding American tradition. It is becoming rarer, though, as censorship intensifies.
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The Kennedy Center ($40 million), gender programs in Pakistan ($25 million), military assistance for Egypt ($1.3 billion), stimulus checks for the family members of illegal immigrants ($1,800 each).
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We've all read — or watched — Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol." The story has so permeated our discourse that characters like Scrooge and Tiny Tim are employed as similes for miserliness and poverty. We also tend to remember, and use as metaphor, the trio of ghosts that visit Scrooge, ultimately precipitating a change in his soul for the better.
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As the last days of 2020 dissipate, coronavirus lockdowns, quarantines and isolation are escalating. The year will surely be remembered as one when freedom faltered. As natural as the morning light is the yearning for freedom, but fear of disease is erecting sturdy barriers that thwart the inborn desire for autonomy. Trends that predate the pandemic signal that the new year will likely bring additional challenges in the struggle against forces that oppose the irrepressible impulse to be free.
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In the era of extreme political double-standards, what the Democratic apparatus has planned in the coming months and years is sure to stupefy — and upset — all good Americans. The first big flashpoint, of course, will occur over the Biden-Harris Cabinet appointments.
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"No one is illegal" is about to become more than a trendy T-shirt slogan.
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The 2020 presidential election has been essentially settled, with Joe Biden positioned to unseat Donald Trump as commander in chief. Central to the apparent Biden victory was the solid backing of the U.S. intelligence community.
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Hanukkah, the eight-night Festival of Lights commemorating the rededication of the Second Temple during the second century B.C., is now underway for Jews across America. Menorahs are being lit, games and gifts enjoyed, good food consumed, and, where possible in this time of COVID-19, extended family assembled.
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Santa Claus has arrived early this year, and he looks a lot like Donald Trump. With the addition of a white beard, a red, fur-trimmed suit and just a few extra inches of girth, the man from Queens could pass for the king of elves, especially considering what he's loading into his gift sack. The life-saving COVID-19 vaccine that he promised to deliver has arrived in record time. Hallelujah.
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There is something to be said for letting bygones be bygones, but the ones with grievous repercussions aren't really gone. The anomalies, inconsistencies and apparent fraud revealed following the 2020 presidential election is poisoning the well-being of the nation.
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With pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC announcing support this week for a proposed $23 billion weapons sale of American F-35 fighter jets, advanced armed Reaper drone systems, and air-to-air and air-to-ground munitions to the United Arab Emirates, the ground now is as smooth as can be for the Trump administration to proceed in a transaction that will lend further stability — in a counterbalance to Iran — to a sometimes volatile region.
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Presumptive President-elect Joe Biden is understandably anxious to take over the nation's fight against the COVID-19 pandemic that has killed upward of 285,000 Americans.
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As millions buckle under the strain from a year of disease and privation, Democrats want their constituents to know that help is on the way. Relief funds are important, of course, but first things first: At the top of the party's to-do list is not money, but marijuana.
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At the end of last week, the November jobs report was released, with news the economy regained 245,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate dropped from 6.9% to 6.7%. This would seem like good news except economists had widely anticipated a much higher gain, and worry that the tick-down in unemployment can be attributed to people simply dropping out of the labor market.
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Thinkers of lofty thoughts have high hopes for a "Great Reset," a wholesale reordering of society in order to achieve "fairer outcomes." Conveniently, the COVID-19 pandemic has ripened the moment for the envisioned transformation. Integral to the process, according to reset advocates, is a switcheroo from a consumption economic model to a sustainably "green" one, with the added benefit of saving the planet from global warming. The only problem is it's not working.
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CNN on Monday published a report made possible by troves of internal documents provided by a Chinese health care whistleblower proving that the CCP published misleading data on the coronavirus, downplaying caseload and death count. What's amazing about this revelation is not that President Xi Jinping countenanced lying to the world, but that CNN published the expose in the first place.
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Joe Biden's Election Day ace card was pinning responsibility for America's devastating COVID-19 death count on Donald Trump. The ruination wrought by the virus here, though, was the result of the cause over there, in China. The United States ought not to allow responsibility for this man-made disaster to simply recede in the rear-view mirror of history. A President Biden must make certain that it doesn't — by holding China accountable for its role in the calamity. A signature "C'mon, man" or two won't do.
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Understandably, with COVID-19 raging, America — and the world — has turned its attention inward. But, as evidenced by the recent assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, Iran's top nuclear scientist, the business of international relations has not paused. With escalating international tensions, America must continue to lead — both in arms and moral fortitude.
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Not many years in living memory have been as bleak as 2020, but Americans are doing their level best to dispel the gloom during the season of giving. The coronavirus pandemic that dampened Thanksgiving celebrations from coast to coast only sharpened enthusiasm for the ensuing shopping spree of Black Friday. The unfolding holiday period demonstrates there is little market for misery during the most spirit-filled time of the year.
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