Today is supposed to be a good day. Former President Trump no longer wields a modicum of official power over the United States of America, and if enough Senators do their job correctly, he will be banned from holding power again. Former President Donald J. Trump will be shunned.
Today is supposed to be a good day. Senator Mitch McConnell has lost his grip on the economic, political, and moral progress of this country. He can still exercise tremendous influence as the Senate Minority Leader, but a single senator from Kentucky can no longer prevent the nation’s progress outright.
Today is supposed to be a good day. The President of the United States once again possesses the capacity for empathy. The Vice-President of the United States is once again capable of eating a meal with a person of the opposite sex without requiring her significant other to be in attendance. The overseers of our Federal bureaucracy once again recognize the challenges posed by climate change and (at the very least pay lip service to) the moral and fiscal imperatives those challenges engender.
Today is supposed to be a good day. Every employee in the executive branch is now free to admit that the citizens of the United States are suffering under the weight of a very real pandemic and that any immediate help the government can provide is already too late in coming and cannot delay a minute longer. Every employee in the executive branch can now be activated to address the real crises that stand before us rather than waste their time, effort, and resources trying to sustain the graces of their Dear Leader.
Today is supposed to be a good day. Transparency, honesty, and a commitment to sharing even the hardest of truths have found a home in front of our national press corps. The White House Press-Briefing Room is once again recognized as a national conference room where professional interrogators can question, criticize, and clarify the actions and decisions of our public servants without becoming villainized for exercising their rights as citizens of our free republic.
Today is supposed to be a good day. Cynicism, cronyism, and unfettered capitalism have been ushered out the door of the White House. A belief in the necessity of the regulatory state has resumed command of our national economic tools and stands ready to enforce our regulations with the might of the majority.
Today is supposed to be a good day. The legislative and executive branches of the Federal government belong to the nation’s popular majority. The Party representing that majority claims to believe that a democratic government belongs in the hands of the majority (charitably informed and voluntarily restrained by the observations and insights of any citizen who finds themself in the minority). Promising to remove all barriers between a voter and their vote, this melding of power, philosophy, and political principle ought to increase the influence of the people on the levers of our democracy.
Today is supposed to be a good day.
But I fear it may be too late.
Tomorrow the sun will rise. My daughter will come downstairs and show her love for our puppy. My wife and I will make breakfast, make lunch, kiss each other and our daughter and our puppy goodbye, and go off to work, where my wife and I will each come face to face with all of the children who are feeling the weight of this pandemic, the stress in their parents’ lives manifesting as lost patience, abusive hands and language, emotional and physical neglect, addiction, depression, divorce, trauma, and fear. We’ll continue to experience the day to day challenges every child faces thanks to a year of social and educational isolation; a year of uninterrupted (nay, parental and societally enforced) screentime; a year of missed funerals, weddings, birthdays, holidays — a year devoid of ritual. We’ll listen to the students who just need to vent, and we’ll try to engage with the students who have retreated inside themselves. We’ll encourage every burst of curiosity, try to add a spark to every moment of eye contact, and strive to create more significant moments than our tasks give us time for. We’ll use our knowledge and experience, and we’ll put in the work.
But still, that kid in the corner will break down into tears and there will be nothing we can do about it. That parent will pop that pill after swearing off their addiction and there will be nothing we can do about it. That grandmother will die because the hospital was too crowded for the doctor to get to her in time and there will be nothing we can do about it.
Today is supposed to be a good day. But tomorrow, the sun will rise, and the actions and decisions of President Donald J. Trump will still influence our reality. And there will be nothing we can do about it.