A snapshot of a day that will be talked about for some time to come

Some readers know that some of the bonus content I've offered to the LITD Patreon community consists of compilations of archived posts in various categories, going back to this site's earliest days (2012). It's provided illuminating glimpses into fairly recent history, allowing me (and you in the community) the opportunity to revisit key moments from which chains of development were launched. (It's also given me the chance to observe how my blogging style has evolved. I've backed away from certain rhetorical devices as the entire dynamic between sociopolitical forces has shifted - and a major new force (Trumpism) has emerged.)

My perspective on some of those early posts may have changed, but I haven't come across any that I regret writing. I was giving my most honest assessment of particular points in time, and those points in time have proven to have lasting significance. Those posts have a kind of time-capsule significance.

It's in that spirit that it seems to me a lasting documentation of the lay of the land in the second week of March 2020 is in order. So much is happening today that it can make one's head swim.

I haven't had much to say about the coronavirus, mainly because people with far more expertise in the public health realm are still speaking as if the jury is out. Statistics show that other viruses, including the common flu -which is a broad-brush way to speak about a range of microbes - kill far more people proportionally than this virus has so far. Those recommending a balance between prudential precaution and continuance of normal daily life seem to be the adults in the room at the moment.

As I say, I'm no public health authority, but it seems plain that Donald Trump's attempts to convey the message that everything is under control are looking increasingly flimsy:

Fissures between the White House and national health agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have begun to expand as the coronavirus pandemic spreads to more American states, creating dissonance between President Donald Trump and the professionals tasked with containing the virus further.

The two sides have grown increasingly distrustful of one another, people inside both the CDC and the White House say, as officials on each side question decisions that either appear designed to downplay the growing crisis or to generate further concern.

The cracks are falling along predictable lines. While health officials have sought to present a realistic and cautious picture of the national situation, Trump and his political allies are hoping to relay an altogether different message: that the virus is contained, Americans face little risk, and life should proceed as normal.

And it's true that while concerns about global supply-chain disruption due to this virus are a significant factor in the stock market free fall we're seeing, it's also being driven by a fissure between OPEC and another oil producer that is normally its ally, namely, Russia. Saudi Arabia is dealing with the problem of over-production by initiating a price war. 

Elevating domestic politics to the level of these possible calamities may seem inappropriate generally speaking, but we are well into an election year, and the stakes involved in the circumstances that are appearing demand our consideration.

Trump's cocktail of bombast and denial is, of course, unhelpful. The nature of what the alternative to his antics is going to be has changed in the last couple of weeks, though.

There are two left standing on the Democrat side. Aside from the matter of that party asking itself, given the primacy of identity politics to its raison d'être,   how it came to the juncture at which the choice would be between two straight white men in their late 70s, there are problems of how either would be perceived by the overall voting public once we've arrived at the general-election phase of the current cycle.

Bernie Sanders's marked decline in electability stems from the Democrats' realization that his explicit proclamation of what all the original lineup of candidates, to one degree or another, had stood for, was beyond palatable to most Americans. There are, of course, those of the opinion, that his overt radicalism is exactly what Democrats will need to defeat Trump, but Super Tuesday's outcome would seem to indicate that this is a niche outlook.

And there seems to be a hint of desperation in the recent spate of endorsements for Biden. Does anyone really think that Kamala Harris's little video oozed sincerity, particularly given their raw moments of interaction on the debate stage? Not only does Biden make a tepid standard-bearer for 2020 progressivism, the question of whether his bodily frame - particularly the command center within his skull - is up to the rigors of the last eight months of a presidential campaign now looms large.

Again, as in the case of the coronavirus, I'm far from able to conclusively assess someone's mental fitness, but evidence that Biden's is not at its peak is piling up.

If he really is cognitively fading, what does it say about Democrats, and that strange sliver of conservative Trump skepticism that finds Biden a viable alternative, that they might be willing to put a man through the coming ordeal when he should be resting comfortably at home? Is that really any way to rescue a nation from the present incoherence, and the cult following that sustains it?

So that is the LITD snapshot of where things stand in post-America mid-afternoon March 9, 2020.

We'll muddle through in some fashion. There's a sense, though, that developments are occurring that will have ramifications for our range of options on a number of levels of daily life for at least the intermediate term.