A Journal of the Plague Year 2020–chapter 167

The Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J.

Friday, November 6

With both political parties focused on the past, some Democrats, disappointed that their party didn’t do better, are blaming those who dared to contemplate the future.

Trump’s appeal has long been nostalgic. Make America Great Again was the slogan, while the subtext was: turn the country back over to tough-talking white men who will bring back the 1950s. Biden, meanwhile, offered very little in the way of a program other than promises to return the U.S. to the calm and sanity of the Obama years.

Democratic fantasies that Biden’s backward-looking approach would lead to a “blue wave” of U.S. Senate wins and statehouse takeovers did not pan out. Who is to blame? Must be A.O.C. and the Squad of socialist women of color. 

In California, where polls show that housing is the No. 1 issue on voters’ minds, a ballot initiative that would have expanded tenants’ rights and rent control was voted down. Also defeated was a proposition that would have given greater labor protection to ride-share and delivery drivers. In Florida, Trump won by a 3 percentage point landslide, thanks in some measure to the ongoing anti-Communist impulses of Cuban Americans and other Latinos. “I see the leftists in the Democrat Party,” the Times quoted one Trump voter as saying. Trump “has what it takes to be president, and he’s a strong man.”

Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger, who represents a conservative district in Virginia, said the blame for Democratic losses in the House should go to those who promoted the “defund the police” movement and who failed to denounce socialism. South Carolina’s James Clyburn said Democrats couldn’t win if they favored Medicare for all.  Texas’ Marc Veasey said anti-fracking rhetoric hurt Dems as well.  

In response, Squad member Rashida Tlaib, a progressive freshman Democrat from Detroit, said “I feel like I’m being asked to be quiet” but her constituents “didn’t elect me to be quiet.”

In a Tweet, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez added: “honestly when it comes to Latinos the party’s just never seriously made an effort. Mexicans, Central Am, Caribbean, Chicanos—Cubans are not the only important community.”

So, once again, Democrats will be fighting each other. 

And it’s anyone’s guess what Trump, his enablers, and wacko family members will do in the years ahead. They could just shut up and spend the coming years on the putting green at the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. 

Yeah…sure they will.

Dinner: We celebrate a midday Peapod grocery delivery with an Amy’s frozen pizza and a green salad.

Entertainment: In honor of recently deceased Geoffrey Palmer, we watched an episode of the very old Butterfly and two episodes of As Time Goes By.