Category: government

supporting those with lymphoma

I admire Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland. He is a lawyer and Constitutional scholar just beginning his fourth term in Congress. He served as an impeachment manager in the second trial of Donald Trump and just completed his work on the 1/6 Select Committee.

It’s heartbreaking that he lost his son just days before the 1/6/21 attack on the Capitol. I admire Rep. Raskin’s ability to continue in public service in the aftermath of both personal and national challenges.

He has recently announced a new challenge, a battle with lymphoma. He is about to embark on chemotherapy and plans to continue working while he is being treated. I wish him every success in beating his cancer.

I have a college friend who is also currently in treatment for lymphoma and continue to pray for her full recovery.

I have a lot of hope for their long-term remission because treatment protocols for many types of lymphoma have a good record of success.

My father, known here at TJCM as Paco, was diagnosed with lymphoma about twenty years ago. He received chemotherapy and lived to be 96 without a recurrence. I know my father’s experience is anecdotal, but, for me, it helps to have a personal story to add to the data and statistics.

I invite readers who are so inclined to send out healing thoughts/prayers for Jamie Raskin, for my friend J, and for all those dealing with lymphoma. People who are in a position to make a charitable donation may wish to support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society , which is highly rated by Charity Navigator.
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In one of those bizarre coincidences, I had drafted this post earlier, planning to use it for Linda’s Just Jot It January at some point. When I looked up today’s post to do the pingback, I found out the prompt word is “cancer.” Obviously, this post was meant to be shared today.

One-Liner Wednesday: Speaker-less

Yesterday, for the first time in a hundred years, the United States House of Representatives failed to choose a Speaker on the first day of the new Congress, when Kevin McCarthy failed to get a majority of votes on three attempts, despite the fact that his Republican party holds a slim majority.

This update to my post from yesterday is brought to you by Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays and Just Jot It January. Join us! Details here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/01/04/one-liner-wednesday-jusjojan-the-4th-2023-courage/

late 2022 US political wrap-up

In the media, there are lots of summaries and lists as the old year closes and the new one begins.

Here at Top of JC’s Mind, I sometimes post about US politics to summarize what has been going on and offer my viewpoint in such a way that people who don’t follow US politics can get the gist of the situation. Over these last few weeks, though, it’s been impossible to keep up and synthesize what has been going in with the various investigations into our former president.

The House Select Committee on January 6th held its final public hearings and issued an 845 page final report. It has also released thousands of pages of transcripts from interviews they conducted. I haven’t been able to read all the materials but have seen and heard commentary from lawyers and analysts I trust. With these materials, there is lots of publicly available evidence showing what seemed to be happening at the time: that President Trump knew that he had lost a fair election to Joe Biden but orchestrated an elaborate plot to lie about it and try to stay in power. The plot encompassed not only the ultimate 1/6/21 attack on the Capitol but also pressure on lawmakers in various states to throw out legally cast votes and appoint alternate electors to the electoral college, pressure on the vice-president to fail to certify the electors so that the election would be thrown to the House where each state would get one vote and Trump would likely win, and the call for Trump supporters to descend on Washington and “be wild” on January 6th when Congress would meet to fulfill their Constitutional duty to certify the presidential and vice-presidential election.

The Select Committee referred Donald Trump and others to the Justice Department on a number of counts, including obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make a false statement, and inciting, assisting, and/or giving aid and comfort to an insurrection. The Justice Department will be deciding in the coming months whether or not to file these charges or others. We know that there are grand juries reviewing evidence but we don’t know what they will decide or when. It does seem, though, that things are moving more quickly since the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Jack Smith and the Justice Department are also investigating other possible crimes of Donald Trump and his administration. One area of investigation is the presidential documents that Trump took with him when he left office. He then defied subpoenas to get the documents back to the National Archives. Some of the documents that have been recovered were classified, including some that should only be viewed in a secure location. Legal analysts think that the documents case may be getting close to the point of indictment.

Another area that is coming under public scrutiny is Donald Trump’s personal and business tax returns. Since Nixon, presidential candidates have released their tax returns publicly and have placed their business investments in a blind trust so that the public can see that they aren’t being influenced by personal financial factors when they are making decisions for the country. Trump refused to do this and fought the House Ways and Means Committee request to review his taxes and the IRS audits that should have been routine for all presidential and vice-presidential tax returns. The IRS hadn’t even begun the audits until Ways and Means Committee Chair Rep. Richard Neal requested them in 2020, midway through Trump’s term. Trump fought the returns being turned over all the way to the Supreme Court, which finally decided that they should be made available to the Committee just a few weeks ago. The Committee redacted personal data like Social Security numbers and released six years of returns publicly just a few days ago. They show that the Trumps paid little or no federal income taxes in most of those years and showed lots of business losses. There are lots of questions about the legality of some of the deductions, business expenses, and losses, but it will take forensic accountants to unravel all that information.

The release of the tax returns follows the recent New York State court ruling that convicted the Trump Organization of tax fraud. Trump, his three elder children, and the Trump Organization are also named in a civil lawsuit in New York for fraud for lying to insurers and lenders about the value of assets.

Meanwhile, in Georgia, a grand jury has been hearing evidence about attempts to overturn Biden’s victory in the state. After they finish their report, the Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis may decide to indict Trump in the case. It’s possible that federal charges could be made in the same case, but it’s worth noting that, if Trump were convicted on state charges, he could not be pardoned by a future Republican president, as would be possible for federal convictions.

I think that it is likely that Trump will be indicted on numerous charges over a period of time. It seems that there is a lot of evidence of guilt and I am hoping there will be accountability for Trump and for those who took part in the planning and execution of crimes against the Constitution and the people of the United States.

Guilty pleas or verdicts on some of the possible charges would bar Trump from ever again holding office. Of course, despite the losses of many Trump-backed candidates in the midterms, Trump has already declared himself as a presidential candidate for the Republican party for the 2024 election. So far, the campaign does not have many backers but I am scared about the prospect of Trump ever holding political power again, having experienced the harm he has already inflected.

Meanwhile, the new Congress is being sworn into office. It’s still unclear if Kevin McCarthy has enough votes to be elected Speaker of the House. (As I publish this, the House is schedule to convene for the Speaker vote in a couple of hours.) The Republicans are arguing among themselves so much that it may not be possible for them to pass much legislation, especially bills that the Democratic majority in the Senate would also agree to pass so that they could become law.

I’m trying to remain hopeful that support from Congress for Ukraine will remain strong, as well as for keeping the basic functions of the federal government running. The Republicans don’t have a great record for passing bills, though, so we’ll have to wait and see. I have the feeling that I will need to write to my member of the House frequently; he is a newly elected Republican who stressed his ability to work with Democrats to get things done. We’ll see if he can do that on the federal level. With the House majority so slim (only a four seat margin for Republicans), a handful of Republican moderates could join with the Democrats to pass bills, even if they have to use the discharge petition process to force a floor vote.

We’ll see.
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This post is part of Linda’s Just Jot It January. Join us! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/01/03/daily-prompt-jusjojan-the-3rd-2023/

two years into COVID vaccines

After yet another period of high community risk level for COVID here in Broome County, New York, we have just today returned to medium level. After a post-Thanksgiving spike in infections, we experienced a hospitalization spike which had increased our community risk level. With the US health system also dealing with an early, hard-hitting flu season and RSV, the dreaded triple-demic, in some areas hospitals are reaching capacity and sending patients to other locations. Additionally, infection rates are predicted to rise as family and friends gather for Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Year celebrations in the coming weeks.

This comes at a time when only 14.1% of people five and over in the US have received the new bivalent COVID booster, which was designed to better combat the Omicron BA.4/5 variants and is proving effective against the current dominant strains, BQ1 and BQ1.1, which are part of the BA.5 lineage.

Furthermore, a recent study indicates that the US vaccination program likely saved 3.2 million lives and prevented 18.5 million COVID-related hospitalizations. The vaccines are estimated to have averted nearly 120 million infections. Another recent study shows that in the two years of COVID vaccine availability in the US, the excess death rate among Republicans is significantly higher than among Democrats, mirroring the difference in vaccination rates, a sad reflection of the politicization and misinformation around vaccines by many prominent Republicans.

It’s horrifying.

The mistrust sown over the COVID vaccine among Republicans seems to be spreading to other vaccines as well. A newly published survey finds that over 40% of Republican or Republican-leaning respondents oppose requirements for the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) for school children.

This does not bode well for public health measures. It’s frightening how many people will believe politicians or media figures rather than doctors and public health experts on these important issues. People have been infected because they weren’t up to date on vaccinations. People have been hospitalized, developed long COVID, experienced complications, or died at higher rates because they refused vaccines or boosters. The data show this.

Please, get a bivalent COVID booster if you are eligible. Begin or continue the primary vaccination series if you haven’t completed it. If you get symptoms, test immediately and contact a health professional if you test positive to see if antiviral medication is right for you. Don’t go out and expose others if you sick with COVID, flu, or anything else. Mask indoors when infection levels for COVID, flu, RSV, etc. are high in your area. Avoid crowds. Increase ventilation. Wash hands and avoid touching your face – more for flu/cold prevention than COVID. Try to eat and sleep as well as possible.

If you are someone who has been getting health information from pundits, please turn to your personal health care provider, public health department, or national health organizations, such as the CDC. Look for data and advice from public health experts, not anecdotes.

For readers outside the US, turn to your public health experts to see what measures are available and appropriate for you.

Reminder to all: COVID 19 is still a global pandemic. Act accordingly for your health, your household’s and community’s health, and global health.

delayed, partial justice for Dimock

I live in Broome County in New York’s Southern Tier. My town is on the border with Pennsylvania. During the early years of the fracking boom – technically, horizontal hydraulic fracturing with long laterals or shale gas drilling – I was involved with efforts to keep fracking out of New York and to support our PA neighbors who were being devastated by it. My main role was providing factual comments on articles in the media and reading research and articles to make sure I was accurate and up-to-date.

I also attended rallies, panels, and press events, with a bit of bird-dogging on the side. (Bird-dogging is the practice of showing up in places where a public official is speaking or visiting with signs for your cause in order to increase your visibility with the official and, if you’re lucky, the press. It is not illegal or disruptive.) Through these events, I heard from the people of Dimock, PA, which is about thirty miles south of my home, and their allies about the horrible environmental impacts and suffering that fracking was causing there.

Cabot Oil & Gas was the company that was drilling there at the time. In 2008, they contaminated the water supply but refused to take responsibility for the damage. The elected officials and Department of Environmental Protection did not intervene as they should have. Cabot did settle with some people whose homes were affected but with gag clauses that prevented them from saying anything about the situation, although the fact that some houses were torn down and that the lots were restricted from new construction spoke volumes. Meanwhile, other neighbors continued to live in houses without usable water, their properties basically unsaleable. Cabot was eventually restricted from further drilling in a nine square mile section of Dimock, but the damage had already been done.

Finally, on November 29, 2022, Coterra Energy, which includes what had been Cabot, pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor violation of the PA Clean Streams Law, even though they had originally been charged on fifteen counts, including nine felonies. They are ordered to pay $16 million for a water system to bring fresh water to Dimock, which, like many rural towns, has gotten its water from individual water wells. Coterra will also pay the water bills for 75 years for current and future residents.

I found out about the plea from this video by area resident, fracktivist, and citizen-journalist Vera Scroggins. It shows the press conference from the courthouse. The main speaker is Josh Shapiro, current attorney general and governor-elect of Pennsylvania. His office brought the charges against Cabot in 2020, before the merger that formed Coterra. Also speaking is Victoria Switzer, a Dimock resident who has been a leading voice in the cry for justice. After the press conference, Vera includes clips from a rally at the courthouse, featuring more familiar faces and voices from the anti-fracking movement.

I appreciated seeing the people who fought so long and hard for some measure of justice for the affected residents of Dimock, even though it is fourteen years late. As Victoria Switzer pointed out in the news conference, some people have passed away in those years. Others were forced to move out of the area. The fractures among townsfolk may never be mended, as some who had leased their property for drilling became hostile toward those whose water was contaminated because Cabot had to stop drilling and, therefore, paying royalties.

I am sickened to learn this week that, on the same day the plea was entered, the Department of Environmental Protection changed the order regarding gas extraction in the nine square mile area in Dimock. While Coterra may not drill vertically in that area, they are now allowed to drill horizontal laterals into it. These miles-long laterals will be burrowing into the Marcellus shale from vertical wells outside the exclusion zone and then explosive charges will fracture the shale to release fossil methane and potentially other types of hydrocarbons. Theoretically, that methane is then collected from the well for use. In practice, though, some of it also migrates through the rock layers for thousands of feet where it can contaminate aquifers or even reach the surface and cause atmospheric pollution. Additionally, fracking can mobilize radon and other naturally occurring radioactive elements, as well as waste products from the fracking fluids and brine. I am dumbfounded that DEP is risking further pollution in Dimock when so many have already suffered so much.

Article I, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution states, “The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment.” It’s (past) time for the Pennsylvania government to honor that Constitutional provision.

election reflection

When I finally made myself post about the upcoming midterm elections in the US, I knew I’d have to do a wrap-up post, so here goes…

The election outcomes were more positive than I had feared but not as good as I had wished. Some of the ultra-MAGA candidates lost and accepted defeat but a few that lost are refusing to concede. Some who won their races are trying to leverage their position to move legislatures to the extreme right. This is particularly worrisome in the House of Representatives, where some individual Congress members are threatening to withhold their votes to make Republican Kevin McCarthy speaker of the House unless he agrees to undertake certain investigations that come out of right-wing conspiracy theories.

Technically, the election season is not quite over yet. While the Democrats picked up a Senate seat which gives them the majority of 50-49, the race in Georgia is going to be decided in a run-off in a few days. If current Senator Raphael Warnock is re-elected, the Democrats will hold a clear majority of 51-49, which will also give them a majority of committee seats and make confirming President Biden’s nominees quicker and easier in the new session. Theoretically, this would also help make legislation easier to pass but it’s unlikely that the Republican House will pass many bills that the Senate cares to take up. Given that the Republicans don’t really have a platform, it seems they are more inclined to undertake endless investigations than to actually try to make laws and pass budgets.

The impending change in the balance of power in the Congress has led to a push to enact as much legislation as possible before the end of the year. One thing that should happen is raising the debt ceiling; in my ideal world, it would be abolished but I doubt that is in the cards. There needs to be a budget resolution passed. I’d love action on voting rights, codifying reproductive health access, gun safety, care for children and the vulnerable, and anti-poverty programs like permanent expansion of the child tax credit. One major piece of legislation that has passed is marriage equality, which was in place in only some states before the 2015 Obergefell decision from the Supreme Court made it legal nationally. Given the current Court’s eagerness to overturn precedent, an explicit law from Congress will be helpful in ensuring the continuing right to marriage the partner of one’s choice.

I believe that the Republicans were only able to regain the House majority because of the Supreme Court’s gutting of the Voting Rights Act, along with their allowing redistricting maps that were found to be unconstitutional by state courts to stand for this election in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Ohio. There was also extensive gerrymandering in Florida and Texas that favored Republicans.

Contrast this with my home state New York. In an attempt to make redistricting fairer, map making was taken out of the state legislature and assigned to a bipartisan commission with an equal number of Democrats and Republicans. Unfortunately, the commission could not agree on a new map and sent two versions to the legislature, which drew its own map and adopted it. The Republicans sued, a court threw out that map, and a new one was drawn by an academic. This delayed our primaries and caused major changes in which some incumbents ran against each other in primaries and others had districts that had a majority of voters that were new to them.

It also led to some representatives shopping for a new district that would elect them, even though they don’t live there. Take my current representative Republican Claudia Tenney as an example. She lives in the present 22nd district, which nonsensically lumps part of the Southern Tier where I live with the Utica area where she lives. When it looked like one of the commission or legislative maps was going to be adopted, she had filed to run in the Southern Tier district to my west which was an open seat because the Republican incumbent had resigned. When the court map was adopted, she changed to run in the new 24th district which had been most of the district of the retiring Republican John Katko. I don’t know whether or not she plans to move. I now live in the 19th district and our incoming (Republican) representative, Marc Molinaro, also lives outside our district. I haven’t heard anything from him that he plans to move here, either.

I’ve heard a lot of complaints from national pundits that the Democrats lost the House majority because “the New York legislature is bad at gerrymandering” but they are off the mark. The fact is that the prior maps were drawn when the Republicans had the majority in the State Senate while the Democrats controlled the Assembly. The maps made the House districts upstate, which tends to have more Republicans, lower in population than the downstate districts, which tend to be more heavily Democratic. All the versions of the new maps made the population distribution for each district more even, which is good. Unfortunately, the court’s map that went into effect didn’t give much weight to the prior lines, so lots of voters and candidates were thrown into new districts at a very late date.

For me, that meant going from a central NY district that didn’t really make a lot of sense into a district that stretches from here, through the Catskills and Hudson Valley over to the Connecticut border. It would make much more sense for Binghamton to be included in a Southern Tier district. The Southern Tier is our economic development zone and our regional identity. If we needed to be connected to another region to make the population required, it would make the most sense to include some of the Finger Lakes region. We have much less in common with the Catskills/Hudson Valley.

There are big changes in Democratic Party leadership in the House. The most noted is that Nancy Pelosi, who has been either Speaker or party leader for twenty years is stepping down from leadership. This didn’t surprise me as she had promised to step down from leadership to make room for the next generation. Additionally, she is in her eighties and is recovering from the trauma of the politically motivated attack on her husband and their home before the last election.

Nancy Pelosi has been the most effective House speaker in my lifetime, shepherding through major legislation, such as the Affordable Care Act and the Inflation Reduction Act, with very small Democratic majorities and next to no help from Republicans. She is very astute in figuring out what is possible and bringing along the members to pass it. While she grew up around politics, I think a lot of her success comes from her personal values, shaped by Catholic social justice doctrine and the Constitutional call to “promote the general welfare,” and with her experience raising five children.

Unfortunately, she has been attacked by Republicans in personal and vile terms, which has led to political violence. Besides the recent attack at her home, there are several chilling videos of January sixth insurrectionists threatening her life. That she continues to serve her district and the country is a testament to her strength and convictions as a person and a public servant. I’m grateful that she is remaining in Congress as a mentor in the coming terms, as well as, of course, a powerful voice on policy questions.

When Pelosi stepped down from leadership, her fellow octogenarians Steny Hoyer and James Clyburn also took themselves out of the running for the next two highest-ranking leadership posts. The new top leadership team is Rep. Hakeem Jeffries as Minority Leader, Rep. Katherine Clark as Democratic whip, and Rep. Pete Aguilar as Democratic Caucus chair. They are all in their forties or fifties. Jeffries is the first Black to become leader of a major US political party. Clark is only the second woman, after Pelosi, to be in a top leadership post in Congress. Aguilar is the highest-ranking Latino in Congress.

What is happening with the Republicans is still unclear. While Kevin McCarthy was elected Republican leader, it remains to be seen if he has enough votes to be elected Speaker. It’s also unclear if he or anyone can hold the party together with a slim majority as Speaker Pelosi has been able to do with the Democrats. My fear is that the House Republicans will refuse to craft bipartisan legislation with the Democrats but not be able to hold their own party together to pass bills either. We could wind up with gridlock that leaves even vital legislation in limbo. We’ve seen this before under some past Republican Speakers.

I have a feeling that I will spend the next term writing to Rep. Molinaro, who claims to be a proponent of bipartisanship, asking him to stand up for reasonable legislation that passes the Senate to make it to the House floor for a vote, where it can pass with Democratic and a minority of Republican votes.

Will that happen? I don’t know, but I’ll try to at least start out with that hope.

Review: The Letter

At the Vatican on October 4, 2022, the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi, a new film premiered, entitled The Letter.

The Letter in the title refers to Laudato Si’: On Care for our Common Home, Pope Francis’s 2015 papal encyclical which was addressed not only to Catholics around the world but also to all people of good will. Its release in May helped to build momentum for the Paris climate talks that fall that resulted in 196 countries signing onto the landmark agreement on climate change.

Laudato Si’ espouses integral ecology, which involves both care for the earth and care for all people, especially those most vulnerable. The encyclical cites science and various faith traditions to build a framework for fighting climate change and for lifting up those dealing with hunger, poverty, dislocation, water scarcity, and other challenges.

The film’s title has a second meaning, as the first part of the film shows five people around the world receiving a letter from Pope Francis, inviting them to the Vatican to discuss the issues of Laudato Si’ with him. Together, they represent both “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.” It is these five people and the communities they represent that form the bulk of the film.

They are:
~ Cacique Dadá, an indigenous leader of the Borarí people from the Maró Indigenous Territory of Brazil, representing indigenous communities
~ Arouna Kandé, a climate refugee from Senegal, representing the impoverished
~ Ridhima Pandey, a teen-aged climate justice activist from India, representing young people who are inheriting a world that has been damaged by prior generations
~ Greg Asner and Robin Martin, a married couple from Hawai’i in the United States, who are both marine biologists studying the impacts of climate change on ocean ecosystems, representing the voice of nature

The stories of their native places are stunningly conveyed by director Nicolas Brown and the team of Off The Fence Originals, in conjunction with The Laudato Si’ Movement. I especially appreciated the segments from the Amazonian rain forest and the Pacific marine environments.

I also appreciated the diversity of age, race, gender, country of origin, and faith portrayed in the film. While Pope Francis and the Vatican officials are, of course, Catholic, we see participants who follow other faiths, including Islam and indigenous traditions. It is a true reflection of the encyclical being addressed to “all people of good will.”

In keeping with that diversity, people in the film speak in their native languages with subtitles and narration available in English, French, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese. There are also subtitles available for the entire film in many other languages. You may watch the film free of charge at the link in the first paragraph of this post or on the YouTube Originals channel. Details about offering a free screening for groups can be found here.

My hope is that many people around the world will view the film and take action on social and environmental justice issues. We are one human family and we must together care for each other and our common home.

One-Liner Wednesday: truth telling

The heart of justice is truth telling, seeing ourselves and the world the way it is rather than the way we want it to be. More than ever before we, as a society, need to renew a commitment to truth telling.

bell hooks

Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesday! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2022/11/02/one-liner-wednesday-almost-the-scariest-halloween-ever/

voting and violence

I try to keep up-to-date on the news, particularly in the US, and often blog about what is happening with politics and public policy.

I admit it has been daunting to write about the upcoming midterm elections next week. There has been so much disheartening rhetoric that I haven’t been able to make myself post about it but I feel compelled to post today after watching the continuing aftermath of the horrific attack against Paul Pelosi, spouse of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

For those of you not in the US, early Friday morning, a 42-year-old man broke into the San Francisco home of Paul and Nancy Pelosi. He had zip ties and duct tape with him and asked where Nancy was. (She was in Washington, DC.) He attacked the 82-year-old Paul Pelosi with a hammer, fracturing his skull and injuring his hands and arms. Pelosi is still in intensive care following surgery and is expected to recover over time from his physical injuries. The suspect is in police custody and will be charged soon, most likely for attempted murder among other charges.

The suspect had posted on social media his belief in a number of conspiracy theories, including those that demonize the Democrats as child abusers. While Democrats have been vocal and universal in the condemnation of the attack, Republicans have been much less so. Instead of recognizing this as political violence, some are saying it is just another example of increasing crime. They also fail to acknowledge that their political advertising, posts, and speeches featuring weapons and demonizing Speaker Pelosi and other prominent Democrats have any role in the increase in political violence.

The Republicans do a lot of “what-about-ism” in which they try to create false equivalencies and fear-monger on their talking points, all while conveniently dismissing any responsibility. In this case, they ignore things like the fact that most of the rise in crime is occurring in Republican-controlled areas that have relaxed regulations on guns. It’s likely that one of the reasons that Mr. Pelosi was attacked with a hammer rather than a gun is that California has a more rigorous system of allowing gun permits than Republican-led states, such as Texas. Republicans, including those in New York, blame bail reform for the increase in violent crime, even though the data show this isn’t true. There is also a much higher level of violent extremism on the far right than on the left. And, of course, we have recent and ongoing trials and convictions of perpetrators of political violence on January 6, 2021 at the US Capitol and the thwarted kidnapping of Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer.

My usual way of determining for whom to vote is to look at the stand of the candidate and their party on a range of issues. Given my personal background, I place the highest priority on environmental and social justice issues. This is in keeping with the principles of Catholic social justice doctrine and with the call in the Preamble to the US Constitution to “promote the general welfare.”

I look at the candidates’ character, personal behavior, and integrity. I also look at their personal experience and intelligence. I want to vote for candidates who are smarter and more experienced than I. I don’t choose candidates on the basis of “who I want to have a beer with!” That comment may sound strange to those outside the US but there is recurring theme about this question as a gauge for likability/authenticity since about the year 2000.

In this election, there is an additional factor that I honestly never thought would be an election issue here in the United States. Do you believe in democracy? So many of the Republican candidates seem to be embracing anti-democratic, even autocratic, leadership and policies. They don’t believe in the outcome of free and fair elections, such as the 2020 election, even though they have no evidence to the contrary. They won’t say that they will accept the outcome of their own election if they lose. They won’t say that Biden was legitimately elected president. They have tried and sometimes succeeded in making it more difficult for minorities, elders, young people, and lower-income people to vote. They have broken up likely Democratic voters who live in a community into different voting districts to dilute the power of their vote.

What is most destructive is that they continue to support and perpetrate the lie that Donald Trump won the 2020 election and that he is not responsible for the January 6 insurrection, for illegal possession of presidential documents (including sensitive national security information), for obstruction of justice, and for other crimes for which there is ample, publicly available evidence.

Apparently, Republicans are into wielding governmental power for their own benefit – and the benefit of the wealthy people and corporations who underwrite them – rather than being public servants.

I won’t be voting for any of them.

I will vote for candidates who uphold our American values and who are serious about enacting and executing laws that improve our lives and communities, that try to heal our planet and climate, and that work with all people of good will to end conflict and disease.

I hope millions of others will join in this cause and remember that democracy is on the ballot.

Triple whammy

There are a lot of people sick with respiratory viruses here in the US.

We are still struggling with COVID. Today’s (Oct. 28, 2022) statistics from the Centers for Disease Control show a weekly case count of 265,893 with 2,649 deaths. The case count is almost certainly low, as many at-home positive tests are never reported to health departments and some jurisdictions don’t gather data at all. The uptake of the reformulated boosters has been poor, with only 7.3% of people age five and over having received an updated booster.

While the community risk level map shows the majority of the country in the low (green) level, the community transmission rate is substantial or high in much of the county. You can see the various maps using a drop down menu here. The community transmission rate is based on case counts and/or positive test results; the community risk map also includes data on other factors, such as hospital admissions and stresses on the health care system. A personal illustration: Although the community risk level in my county (Broome in New York State) has been low in recent days, I have had a rash of friends being sickened with COVID. This is explained by our community transmission rate being high, which is the highest of four levels. (As I was writing this post, the maps were updated. Due to the emerging strains on the health care system, our county community risk just shifted from low to high.)

Meanwhile, the flu season has hit earlier and harder than usual. The predominant strain is H3N2, which is known to have a high incidence of complications, especially among young children, elders, and the medically vulnerable. Like many other illnesses, the effects of inflammation from the flu raise the risk of heart attack and stroke for weeks following the initial infection, further endangering not just personal health but also the stability of medical institutions, such as hospitals. So far this flu season in the US, the CDC reports 880,000 flu cases, with 6,900 hospitalizations and 360 deaths. Generally, flu season starts in October but this year it is running about six weeks earlier than usual.

The third virus that is currently surging is RSV (respiratory syncytial virus). For most people, RSV is like a cold but for infants, young children, and elders it can progress to lung infections. These can lead to hospitalization and even death, especially among elders. Unfortunately, there is not yet a vaccine against RSV. I actually participated in a clinical trial for one a few years ago but none has yet reached a level of effectiveness to be approved.

The triple whammy of COVID plus flu plus RSV has already pushed some pediatric hospitals to the edge of their capabilities. Ironically, the RSV rate is a critical factor. Because so many infants and young children were isolated due to COVID risk and lack of day care/school interaction during the pandemic, there is a much larger group than normal that is vulnerable to RSV infection.

There is also concern that the rate of new cases of all three viruses may climb even higher as the weather gets colder and people spend more time indoors.

Some things that people can do to help: Vaccinate as appropriate. Wash hands frequently. Avoid touching your face. Cover coughs and sneezes. Stay home and away from people as much as possible if you get sick. Mask in crowded places or avoid going to them. Get adequate rest and eat healthy foods. If you develop symptoms, talk to a health care provider so you can get testing and supportive treatments to help keep you from developing more severe symptoms and avert a hospital stay, if possible.

I know some level of sickness is inevitable but we can help cut down the case numbers if we watch out for ourselves and our communities.