Most politicians try to make their opponents seem inept and threatening. But no politician in recent memory has falsely demonized his opponents to the extent that Donald Trump has.

 —Can we on this day, Election Day, bring at least a modicum of civility back to American politics by defeating Donald Trump?

 _______________________

Yes, the attacks by the Harris campaign on Donald Trump have also been unusually sharp. But those attacks have been supported by many of those who worked with the former president during his first term—including his vice president. 

—Can we on this day, Election Day, reject the presidential aspirations of a former president who was called “fascist to the core” by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under him, who was said by his own chief of staff to have praised Adolf Hitler? . . .

      There was a time, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when Americans traveling abroad wore maple leaf pins. The idea, of course, was to be taken as Canadians, not that country responsible for the reprehensible Vietnam war.
      We are traveling abroad now, and I wish I had that pin. I wish we didn’t represent the country that might be electing a sociopath.

       We’re not the only country, of course, facing a rising fascist wave. And the wave has already crested in places like Hungary. But we are the country that used to tout itself as the bastion of democracy, of freedom.

       And where we may be heading seems more than scary and inconceivable. It seems embarrassing. It seems humiliating. . . .

      Whatever the outcome of this election – and I damn well hope Democrats win – Kamala Harris deserves America’s thanks.  She’s been called stupid, a whore and the C word, and asked if she’s really black.  She’s been dissed by some Democrats I know as a tepid candidate, not quite the lesser of two evils since the other guys is so evil but nonetheless maybe not quite up to the job of being our next president and maybe not the best candidate who might have led the Democratic ticket.

      I’d like to say something else: “Thank you, Kamala.” You were forced into a presidential race at breakneck speed by a president who had no business seeking a second term and by a White House staff that presumably helped hide that fact. You had to deal with racism and sexism that were inevitable for anyone nominated to be the first black woman to lead a major party in the race for the presidency. And you had to do all of this while running against a cult figure I can’t describe as anything other than a mob boss, who threatens people, and lies often and with impunity. And yet you, Kamala, are on the brink of history, the cusp of victory. . . .

      The days are dwindling down, but not the worries. In fact, they seem to be mounting as we get closer and closer to election day.
      Maybe it’s because the closer we get the more unreal it seems that he could actually win. Haven’t people, enough people, seen enough, heard enough?
      Don’t they know what happened at the New York rally in Madison Square Garden? Don’t they care? If there are still undecided voters now, what at this point could possibly help them decide? Why haven’t they decided, why haven’t they made the only reasonable decision? . . .

     Today I’m thinking about hair, and I don’t mean the hippie musical.

       I am talking about the stuff that grows out of our heads. Something happens to our hair as we age.

       First and foremost, the color changes to a drab and unappealing grey or a brassy bright white. My husband’s hair is still brown but he lost most of it in his twenties. I think that is an ok tradeoff.

       I used to have a terrific head of hair which I rarely coiffed or fussed about. Being a hippie, I grew my hair long and natural. That said, my hair turned white in my late thirties. I began to color it a yellow blond for the next twenty years.

       When I hit my sixties I gave up and just let it go full white. Luckily, I have hard water from our natural spring which is full of minerals, and it gives my hair a yellow-green glow. I also rub amber on my hair, which tones down the brassiness and makes me smell yummy. . . .

A two minute video on:

Loch Ness,

Donald Trump

and the philosopher David Hume’s test for distinguishing truth from superstition and lies.

Filmed in Scotland.

      So, the question is: “What was your worst job ever?”  Certainly, it’s a subject that triggers memories, reflections and musings, but what if you don’t really have a worst job ever?

      I’d guess that my first job was when I was about eight years old, assigned to clean up my room. There certainly were some things about that job that I didn’t like, including picking up toys and clothes and putting them away, and prohibiting me from going in to the TV room, resulting in my missing some of my favorite cartoons.  (No option to record a program in 1958.) 

      But there were also benefits, including learning shortcuts to cleaning up a room that avoided the tedious organizational norms. I’d say the benefits outweighed the disadvantages.

      Then, a few years later, I was assigned the job of being a patrol boy, wearing a patrol belt and helping little kids cross a street at a designated corner. …

     On Election Day, the day the future of this country will be decided, I’ll be nearly 6,000 miles away. On the day we decide whether we are, in fact, going to continue being a democracy, I’ll be in the land where democracy was born.

      It will be weird.

      If we can stay up late—say, for us, maybe to midnight—it will only be 5 p.m. on the east coast of the U.S. No polls will have closed, no voting finished. When the last polls in the U.S. close on Election Day, at midnight Eastern Standard Time, it will be 7 a.m. the next day on the island of Crete, in Greece.

      I’m sure the Greeks will be paying attention, as will the whole world. But with the time difference and 6,000 miles of distance, everybody won’t be glued anxiously to CNN, watching the votes trickling in, listening to Wolf Blitzer and the others call, we hope, Pennsylvania for Harris, or Michigan too close to call, or what the early signs are looking like in Arizona. . . .

      The black pickup cruised down Route 28 in Falmouth, MA, heading East, windows wide open, boom box blaring.

       “They’re eating the dogs. They’re eating the cats,” the pro-Trump rapper chanted as the car drifted by.

      It was all part of Saturday’s political carnival at one the town’s busiest intersections.

      Mind you, I live in a blue town in one of the country’s bluest states. But you'd never have known it Saturday at the intersection of Route 28 and Worcester Court. I joined other Democrats holding signs for Harris-Walz and statewide candidates from 10 a.m. to noon.

      But often we were outflanked, and sometimes outnumbered, by a group called Women for Trump, who arrived with MAGA flags, a bull horn and the encouragement of lots of horn-honking and yelling supporters, who drove by and sometimes doubled back to cheer them on again.

      Part of me saw this as ominous. It’s clear Trump supporters are angry, aggressive and motivated this year.  But I could see it as a positive, too. . . .

A plea

—in the form of a short video—

for Americans to reject Donald Trump

as decidedly and frighteningly unAmerican.

Click here for video.

      “. . . .Any respect or affection I had for the Washington Post as an institution vanished today after owner Jeff Bezos—a billionaire who loves money more than journalistic integrity—ordered his editorial staff to kill a proposed endorsement of Democrat Kamala Harris—a move that sparked outrage in the Post’s newsroom.

      Instead, the paper lifted a figurative fig leaf over its shriveled genitals, saying it would remain neutral in this, the most important presidential election since the Civil War. . . .”

      I won’t lie: moving at our age, 72, was difficult. (Or maybe I’ve just repressed how stressful it has always been.)

      After 25 years in our traditional two-story home, we recently moved to a (mostly) one-level ranch home. It’s a brand-new house, with a kitchen I love, so I’m thoroughly enjoying it. I’m glad we didn’t wait until we were even older. This process does not get easier as one ages.

      The six-month downsizing and moving process seemed endless as the new house was being built and as I sorted through furniture and belongings that wouldn’t be coming with us. Having one’s house up for sale is stressful at best, traumatic at worst. Keeping the staged house perfectly clean while caring for our aging dog was challenging.

      Finally, we moved on the day that hurricane Helene came through North Carolina—you can imagine how much fun that was.

      The World Series isn’t what it used to be. It used to be, to mix a sports metaphor, the Super Bowl.

      A number of decades ago, it drew the nation’s focus, like few other regularly scheduled events could do. That was true particularly for those of us who were young at the time.  

      And yet, when I was a kid, the World Series, which starts today, wasn’t even really a world series.

      Major League Baseball, at that time, didn’t have many players from the rest of the world, from Japan or Korea or Cuba—except for Orestes “Minnie” Minoso—or from Panama, Venezuela or even the Dominican Republic. For that matter, baseball didn’t even have many native-born Black players since this was just a few years after Jackie Robinson.

      What it did have was a kind of mysterious, alluring uniqueness. …

      I recently came across the term “Generation Jones” to describe people born in the United States between the years 1954 and 1965, the subgroup of people sandwiched between the Baby Boomers and Generation X. Although the term was coined many years ago by cultural critic Jonathan Pontell, I had not heard it before.

      As someone born in the early 1960s, the description of Jonesers resonated with me—I’ve often felt not old enough to be a boomer and too old to be a Gen Xer. I seemed to occupy a liminal space: too young for the British Invasion and too old for grunge; too young for “The Graduate” and too old for “The Breakfast Club.”

      Younger boomers coming of age in the 1960s wanted to fuel change—the civil rights struggle, Vietnam. We Jonesers seemed most worried about finding a good job after graduating college.

      Generation Jones refers to the idea of “keeping up with the Joneses” and “jonesing,” meaning intensely desiring something. ...

      Kamala Harris could still eke out a victory on her own. She has run a smart and robust campaign, though at times in my view one that’s too cautious.  She has had to walk a tightrope between standing with an unpopular president with whom she’s serving and showing herself to have new ideas, fresh energy, independence on international issues, and a commitment to the future.

      Harris has emphasized character—the chasm between her character and that of her opponent. Yet, too many Americans seem fixated on two issues: the economy and immigration—issues that Donald Trump has distorted to his advantage. Harris has countered with her own more reasonable economic proposals, and she has made clear that she supports a bipartisan and rather sweeping immigration bill. Yet, wrong or not, most believe Trump is more likely to fix these problems.  She also has strong and well-articulated positions on a range of other issues (women’s rights, health care, child care, and more), yet for many voters these seem secondary.

      Yes, Harris can still win. But the issue of character – and to me it is absolutely the only issue – has to stick. . . .

      Trump up 1 in North Carolina. Trump up 2 in Arizona. Georgia, 2 again.

      The polls are making us crazy. Need to stop looking at the polls. Need to stop worrying.

      But the fact is, we are worried. With so little time before the election, the thought is unavoidable: that son of a bitch might actually win. He could be president again. What had seemed inconceivable—that we could elect a racist, incompetent, sociopathic, fascistic, lying buffoon again—now seems more than conceivable. It may almost seem likely. . . .

      Our homebase is the 14^th-century walled hill town of Montepulciano, where we try to coordinate our long-term rental villa apartment with the annual celebration of the fall's olive harvest.

      From travel guru Rick Steves, we learned years back to adopt the travel concept of becoming "Temporary Locals," in which you immerse yourself in all things local. So, Lynne and I make a point to learn names, memorize local maps, attempt to speak passable Italian, dive into local lore, customs, history and lifestyle.

      Mostly it's about developing and maintaining relationships, so this time around, we could walk into Giuseppe’s shop, call him by name, and be greeted in return with "Buongiorno, Lynne y Giacomo!"

      Lynne and I came here first in 2015, to celebrate our 70th birthdays and our 20th wedding anniversary. Now, on our eighth return here—our Italian home away from home—our love for this place has only been all the more reinforced. …

      I’ve been canvassing for North Carolina’s Wake County Democratic Party, which is headquartered in Raleigh, NC. I volunteered to knock on doors at the homes of the very conservative rural farmers in the nearby towns of Zebulon and Youngsville.

      It’s Trump country! In addition to Trump signs on their homes, some even had Confederate flags!

      My mission was to break the super majority that Republicans now hold in the North Carolina legislature by convincing them to vote for the Democratic candidate that represents them in the state House. I listened to their issues. …

      I walked from the concession stand concourse through the tunnel and into that very ballpark on the mezzanine level. I was standing at the railing on the third-base side taking it all in: the iconic facade, the Bronx skyline beyond and the grass. 

      Up from my subconsciousness came a blubbering stream of tears. Then I saw the ghosts of my parents in the left-field seats where I had always pictured them on their 1946 date, when she had reached across him for a hot dog, blocking his view for just an instant while somebody hit something somewhere and with some significance. 

      No damage was done to their courtship, but he teased her about it regularly—and she rolled her eyes, for the next 30 years. …

      I’ve been a volunteer election official for the Wake County Board of Elections in North Carolina since 2016. Trump’s first run at the presidency prompted me to serve.

      After nine primaries and one run-off, eight early voting stints and eight November election days, I’m at it again. It’s exhilarating and exhausting at the same time. But I’ve never encountered what I experienced on Day #1 of this year’s early voting at my polling location.

      The lines never let up from the time the polls opened at 8 a.m. to closing at 7:30 p.m. My job was to greet all voters with a smile as they entered the polling place, answer any questions and direct them to a long table with five anxiously waiting volunteers who looked at their photo IDs, found their registrations in the voter database and gave them an ATV (authorization to vote). …