VP Choice, Trump “pro-life”? Florida Biden Supporter, Honduran “Disappearances,” Belarus, Grandson back in class, Sr. Helen Prejean, Spanish ads

 

Kamala Harris as Joe Biden’s running mate checks several boxes: female, African American, Indian American, Jamaican American. It’s quite fitting that a woman is on the ticket on the 100^th anniversary of women’s suffrage. Harris is thrilling a lot of would-be voters who, I hope, will actually cast their ballots. Donald Trump is having a temper tantrum about her candidacy. As he did with Barack Obama, he’s trying to cast doubts on her citizenship, even though she can prove she was born in the US. Trump himself has immigrant forebearers, as do we all, except for native people.

Trump and Mark Meadows are playing hardball on virus relief. They should realize that most would-be voters will blame the president, not Congress, as their personal circumstances and the whole economy tank further as a result. Trump can blame antifa, fake news, Ukraine, and even Bengasi for the economic crash, and only his faithful cadre of true believers will heed his words. His modus operandi is to sow division and to label the shrinking proportion of white folks the only true Americans.

Harris is right that Trump is simply not up to the job. The poor guy has deficits in self-esteem, which he covers up with threats, boasting, and blustering, along with evident learning disabilities (trouble reading, writing, and pronouncing words) and psychiatric problems (constant lying, inventing conspiracies).

However, polls showing Biden ahead fluctuate widely, with some showing only a small lead. The Biden-Harris ticket  needs a much more decisive, an overwhelming, lead. And we have to pray for Joe Biden’s continued good health and the sheer survival of Justice Ginsberg. Biden’s victory will depend on voter turnout and on every vote being counted. Trump and company are doing their level best to disrupt voter turnout and vote-by-mail and to again turn the unrepresentative Electoral College system in Trump’s favor. Our country and the world cannot endure 4 more years of Trump and company, of divisive, dysfunctional, and just plain cruel and mean-spirited governance. Trump knows he is behind and must realize that he has never been popular with most Americans, even less so around the world. But he is trying to fake it and win by any means necessary, by cheating if he can get away with it, as he has done all his life.

No doubt if Joe Biden wins, after the initial relief and euphoria of finally getting rid of Donald Trump, we voters will inevitably find fault with Biden and Harris. Given the damage from the virus and the continued economic downturn, no government can immediately set things right or even get us back to where were before. Inevitably, the honeymoon for Biden will end. But if and when he wins, I will attend his inauguration, just as I did after Obama won his first term, when we all stood cheek by jowl, stepping on each other’s toes, crushed together during a bitter-cold January day, but feeling happy and united.   

If Trump should lose the election by the margin of mail-in ballots sent during the pandemic despite his relentless efforts to starve the Post Office of funds and ordering removal of mail sorting machines and mailboxes, he can then save face by fraudulently claiming fraud. Of course, his own ballot is always mailed.

 Is it “pro-life” to brush aside over 170,000 virus deaths, and counting, in just a few months? “It is what it is,” Trump has shrugged, though he is rumored to be tested daily. What about his own supporters, who might have voted for him, who put faith in his assurances, like poor Herman Cain who attended his Oklahoma rally without a mask and died of the virus not long after? These premature virus deaths are not increasing Trump’s November vote count.

 Nicaraguan-born Republican commentator Ana Navarro is stumping for Biden among Hispanics in Florida. https://news.yahoo.com/biden-camp-taps-gop-trump-222022368.html?soc_src=newsroom&soc_trk=com.apple.UIKit.activity.Mail&.tsrc=newsroom

Not to exaggerate the parallels between Trump and Hitler, as Hitler was cleverer and a much more convincing speaker, but Hitler showed how a determined populist can lead a whole nation astray by vilifying segments of the population, as Trump is trying to do right now. We have to demonstrate that most Americans see through his ruses, rhetoric, and outright lies, despite the abject complicity of so many Republican lawmakers.Bravo to Sen. Mitt Romney for speaking out and daring to buck his party’s trend.

Poor Dr. Deborah Birx was thrown under the bus by Trump for warning that the virus is spreading fast and furious. She seems to have been replaced as Trump’s virus adviser by a doctor more willing to kowtow to Mr. Trump. 

Don Jr. and Eric have sent me more heartfelt cyber appeals on behalf of their father and to keep a Republican Senate for his next term,

Honduras

Five members of an afro-Honduran Garifuna tribe are missing after reportedly being taken away by police.https://www.thedailybeast.com/garifuna-minority-group-fears-genocide-in-trump-backed-honduras

My friend from Belarus recommends the following article. She said protests are erupting all over the country, even in a rural area where her mother has retreated.https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/world-europe-53795871

My 12-year-old great-grandson, living with his mother in Florida, is really tired of on-line school, so plans to attend in-school classes in 7^th grade. Only about a third of his classmates are returning in-person, with the rest joining remotely, leaving plenty of room for social distancing. School will be very different this fall and a big challenge for teachers.

My great-grandson D'Andre and I were together at my house last fall. He has grown taller since.

Heard a radio interview recently with Sister Helen Prejean, whom I met at a book event in Pa. years ago. We both spoke about our books, at that time, her Dead Man Walking and my Triumph & Hope. We chatted, agreeing on our opposition as Catholics to the death penalty, and exchanged signed books. She is a woman about my own age, very approachable and down-to-earth. If more Catholics were like her, I would feel more at home in the church.

How do on-line advertisers and news outlets know I speak Spanish? They keep showing and sending me ads and news items in Spanish. Even the Washington Post comes up in Spanish.