Christmas, is almost here. You can tell, just by watching your local tv news. A government shutdown has once again been narrowly averted, some madman has driven a rented car or truck into a crowd of holiday revelers somewhere in Europe while here in the U.S., some other madman, or school kid, has opened fire on their teachers and classmates in the latest mass shooting. Topping it off, for those planning to travel, the airports are expected to be jammed with record crowds. Oh, and we’re still short on air traffic controllers, a problem the country has had since Reagan walked away from contract talks and locked out their union in 1981, which marked the beginning of the collapse of the union movement in America, and a first major death blow to the American middle class.

Every year, it’s pretty much the same. This year though, there’s icing on the cake with Musk and RFK Jr. making noises about eliminating Daylight Savings Time altogether and cutting back on the use of vaccines, putting us in even more darkness and disease than we’re currently experiencing.

Somewhere in the dark recesses of my brain is the sure fire feeling that what Reagan did to create the air traffic control mess, Trump is gonna do to Ukraine and NATO, and like the air traffic controllers, the upcoming Ukraine tragedy will also last for decades. It’s what the Republicans do. The country, never seems to learn.

And don’t tell me “it could be worse.” Know what? It could be one helluva lot better, too. But we won’t get there by cutting the education budget or banning books or cutting taxes for the uber-wealthy.

Sharing public bathrooms with cross-dressers shrinks into nothingness compared to turning over the reigns of power to greedheads who want to tear away the Social Security program and medical benefits you and your peers have been paying into since you were 15 years old just so they can give even bigger tax breaks to their billionaire friends.

And you wonder why so many journalists end up as alcoholics or drug addicts?