WASHINGTON (MaceNews) – The following is Friday’s status check of developments in the U.S. that can influence economic, health and political outcomes:
- Friday night and another typical week passes into history, but not before President Trump compared himself to Winston Churchill. He said he was not lying. He was advising the country to, “Keep calm and carry on” just as Churchill broadcast from a rooftop while the Luftwaffe bombed London for 56 nights. Of course you might have seen what many regard as a liberal propaganda outlet, CNN, claim along with some historians that Churchill never broadcast from a rooftop, never said, “Keep calm and carry on,” as some posters never used and unearthed a couple of decades ago said. In fact Churchill did write some marvelous prose in 1851, ‘“There is no worse mistake in public leadership than to hold out false hopes soon to be swept away. The … people can face peril or misfortune with fortitude and buoyancy, but they bitterly resent being deceived or finding that those responsible for their affairs are themselves dwelling in a fool’s paradise.”
- It was CNN, after all, that had the nerve to ask a lot of the people who weren’t wearing masks at the president’s MAGA rally in Freeland, Mich. Thursday night, why not? Because the virus is a hoax intended to destroy the United States, said one. Another said God protects him and if he is to die, he’ll die but something like, “We’ve got to get this country moving.” Another held out his mask and asked whether this tiny thing is actually supposed to protect us against a deadly disease? They obviously were not bitterly resenting anything – except maybe CNN.
- Let’s switch to the West Coast, where about 200 fires consume hundreds of houses, three million acres in California, two thousand acres a minute, with flames creeping toward Portland. There social media warns against antifa arsonists running through the woods igniting their gasoline, prompting some people to gather their guns and guard their property, despite the FBI saying nothing like that has happened. You’re supposed to believe the FBI after what the president has said about its past leadership?
- All of which turns the focus on what makes this past week typical along with so many other weeks, the new vulnerability of America, borne of fragmentation and division. Is it unwarranted alarmism to pay any heed to the military strategist who says wargamers elsewhere have to take note of the way a pathogen does not become a common threat in America. The defenses against it do not become common accepted remedies in America. The leaders are not universally respected; institutions like the CDC and the FDA prompt skepticism. A sizable proportion of the population says no to any future vaccine. America is specially vulnerable to a transmissible pathogen.
- Among those leaders and former leaders who are not universally respected is Rudy Giuliani. And yet there he is, on CNN Friday night, being extolled by anchor Chris Cuomo who says, “I will never forget what you did for our city.” Giuliani, defending Trump, said he too knew things during the period he became “America’s Mayor” that he never told the public. The threat of massive flooding in lower Manhattan was something he didn’t talk about, even as he took charge after 9/11 in a way that drew the admiration from nearly everyone, when fragmentation and division was not a factor. America is different now, Many more times than were killed in 9/11 have been killed by COVID-19. The various estimates see hundreds of thousands more dying in the months ahead, more than in any other country, many times more than in a lot of advanced countries.
- Through still another lens, Vice President Mike Pence and presidential candidate Joe Biden fist bumped Friday while both attended the 9/11 memorial observance in New York. The video clip was played again and again because it was not typical. President Trump this week said he “heard” Biden is on some kind of drug. That was typical.
- Something else that was not typical Friday was the Oval Office session in which President Trump acted entirely presidential, taking justifiable pride in another incrementally significant move toward Mideast peace. Bahrain signed on to the normalization of relations with Israel, joining the UAE in the White House signing ceremony Tuesday, with the apparent tacit approval of Saudi Arabia. So decades after Jordan and Egypt formalized the peace, more countries come to the table. No conspiracy theories, no unfounded accusations, no lying, just a bonafide achievement.
- In upcoming economic statistics, retail sales and industrial production and of course fresh claims for jobless benefits, a weekly reminder that more than 13 million people are collecting the benefits, that unemployment is vastly more prevalent than before the pandemic while employment is rebounding more slowly. Kevin Kastner previews the week to come at macenews.com, including the main event, the Federal Open Market Committee meeting Tuesday and Wednesday. And Steve Beckner goes even further, presenting not only a preview of the meeting but also an exhaustive analysis of the Federal Reserve’s new policy framework, all at macenews,com.
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