Doug's Darkworld

A commenter accused me of playing down how awful things were in yesterday’s post. Well, that’s a new one. Heaven forfend!  So to be clear, 2020 is one awful year with multiple terrible things simultaneously going on. Many of them things that in simpler times (say, 2019) would have dominated the news for weeks. Now they are often relegated to the back pages. So let’s review…

The Covid-19 pandemic continues. The first wave never really ended in the US, and now Europe is experiencing a second wave. No vaccine yet, though at least we have learned a lot about how to treat severe cases, so fewer people are dying. Trump promised a vaccine just before the election. Yeah, if one believes that I have some property in Florida they might want to buy. There will be no such vaccine, because Trump will promise whatever it takes to motivate his base. And when there isn’t a vaccine, he’ll blame Biden, China, Antifa, or whoever is on the Trump shit list of the day.

Fires still burning wildly in the American west. It’s just the start of the fire season, so no relief in sight yet. The economic damage from this in both direct and indirect effects will be staggering. The hurricane season is off to a great start with more to come. Both of these are made much worse by poor human actions and global warming. By poor human actions, I mean inadequate building codes and poor zoning. Developers rule, IE the profit motive trumps public safety, the story of America in six words. 

While we are on global warming, the news is worse than ever. Greenland’s ice sheet has melted to a point of no return, according to new study. Pretty much means a 20 foot (6 meter) rise in sea level is inevitable. That’s going to cost a pretty penny. One of the horrifying things about global warming is that feedback will almost certainly speed it up in ways we have yet to anticipate. The good doctor covers some of this nicely in a recent blog: Ice Age Bear Found in Melting Permafrost. 

And the global and American economy are, well, not great. I’m seeing a lot of empty store shelves, this didn’t used to happen in America. Still, I always knew I lived in an unprecedented bubble of prosperity in America. That’s all going away. As an avid amateur historian, there’s no real exact precedents for now. Best is sort of like America in 1941 or 1860. In 1941 most Americans were still hoping to stay out of World War Two. And in 1860, few (if any?) guessed that Lincoln’s election would tear the nation apart. 

So yeah, things still suck on September 17, 2020. I figure at this rate alien invasion, civil war, or World War Three are all on the table before year’s end. I hope I’m wrong. Hell, I probably will be, the final development will likely be worse than any of those possible futures. Scary times. 47 days to the election. An election where both parties are setting it up to claim “foul” if their candidate loses. One can only hope that no matter what happens, it inspires America to go in a more democratic direction. The electoral college is literally bat shit crazy at this point, Trump doesn’t need to appeal to all Americans, he just needs to get his base out in a handful of battleground states. When an election for the leader of a nation of 300 million can essentially ignore the vast majority of the country, not democracy.

There’s been more weirdness. I can’t write anymore tonight. I’ll cover it tomorrow. Trump claims education is child abuse, the mind numbing crimes of the 1%, and the “Covid-19 is Chinese biological warfare” doctor. No shortage of blog topics these days. Stay safe everyone. #StaytheFHome #WearaDamnMask #InsanusTempora

Copyright © 2020 Doug Stych. All rights reserved.

(Image: Facebook meme of unknown genesis, used without permission, claimed as Fair Use under US copyright law. Cow deaths happen.)