PMC Commentary

OK, one big beef before leaving 2021. Maybe 2022 will end it. I hope.

​​​​​"Some of the most open-minded, inclusive people I know struggle with the singular pronoun 'they,'" writes English professor Anne Curzan for the Washington Post. "And while it’s hard to unlearn what we were taught was grammatically 'wrong,' it’s worth doing." Which she thereupon attempts.

To begin she argues that "when we look at the record, we discover the pronoun 'they' has been used as a singular generic pronoun ... for hundreds of years. Shakespeare and Austen both used singular 'they' this way." Curzan provides us no Shakespearean example, and at any rate I would note that Shakespeare wrote in Elizabethan English, which was the transition form from Middle English to Early New English, hence its grammatical rules differed from modern English. But Curzan does supply an example from Austen: "But to expose the former faults of any person," says a character in Pride and Prejudice, "without knowing what their present feelings were, seemed unjustifiable."

You will note, however, that Curzan's Austen example is not an example of using "they." She jumps to "their" instead. "Their" is used most commonly as a plural possessive; otherwise, as a reference to a singular antecedent, which is standard practice when the person's gender is unknown. Curzan herself observes this, though she's impelled to include "they" in the mix as a way to justify her logic: "In many instances, we employ singular 'they' exactly because the gender of the antecedent noun (the person we are referring to) is unknown or irrelevant, as in: 'A serious runner replaces their shoes every few months.'" As noted, when used in reference to an antecedent noun, their is not an example of they. It's only the unknown runner that compels the usage of "their."

Curzan goes on to explain that "they" is "considered wrong only because 200-plus years of grammarians have told us it is wrong, without solidly justifying that judgment." Well, the solid, justified judgment is contained in her denunciation: "They" has been plural in English usage for 200 years — a kind of grammatical stare decisis; precedent takes precedence.

But Curzan isn't through yet. "What is relatively new is the use of singular 'they' to refer to specific people who identify as nonbinary. This leads to a construction such as, 'Alex is spending their senior year in Alaska.'" That could indeed lead to such a construction, but it would be wrong in its plural — and auditory — offense.

Continues The Garbled Grammarian (I love the old "Perry Mason" episode titles): "In the cases where there genuinely is ambiguity about the referent of singular 'they' (e.g., 'I was talking to my mother and her friend, and they said …'), we should rewrite the sentence," since this is "potentially confusing." It is? "They" unambiguously refers to "mother and her friend."

"Third," writes Curzan, "when 'they' is a person’s pronoun, the meaning of the pronoun is not ambiguous: It means the person does not identify within 'he'/'she' binary and identifies as 'they.'" Of course that's what it means in some settings today. But it is ambiguous, and therein lies precisely the bad, disjointed grammar that an English professor should abhor. That, she simply brushes away.

Finally, Curzan chooses to employ the very same imperiousness of which she accuses 200 years of proscriptive grammar: "At least right now, singular nonbinary 'they' has gotten traction, perhaps because it is already established in grammar as a singular pronoun." What of previously "established" grammar? Her assertion implies that established grammar — that which has preceded us — is that of good grammar, yet here it is tossed aside. Curzan may say that singular "they" is established, and even Merriam-Webster may say it's established. That does not mean, however, that it's proper and therefore should filter throughout everyday English.

Curzan concludes on yet another baffling note: "Debates about singular 'they' come from a place of deep caring about language and how it is used. The good news is that we can care about clarity, precision and inclusive pronouns all at the same time."

I certainly care, and care deeply, about language — as do millions of others — which is why I took the time to write this indignant post. The problem with Curzan's conclusion? Clarity and precision are altogether abandoned when language embraces inclusivity through confusing, imprecise, ungrammatical English. If we can say "They is eating," then we can also write that "Pi are 3.14" — and be perfectly grammatical.

"They" can frogmarch me into a reeducation camp, they can torture me, they can starve me and deprive me of water and beat me for days — but they shall never hear me confess they they is right and I is wrong. 

***

P.S.: You want linguistic anarchy? Ponder this potential line from a story: "Andre, Wally, and they discussed their lives at a diner; after dessert, they left." 

Be safe out there. Start 2022 right.

Let's hope 2022 works out better than Buster Keaton's expectations.

Here's to a good (new) beginning, everyone.

Stay safe.

What George Orwell got wrong

In a backhanded appeal to Democrats hoping to brighten a rather grim, midterm election year, George Will recommends that the party's sizable and deeply sincere left wing rehabilitate its sprawling habit of unleashing obscure language on the rest of us. He sensibly observes that "n​​​ormal people, who might want to toss anvils to progressives drowning in their jargon ['wokeness,' 'intersectionality,' 'BIPOC,' 'microaggression' and the like], should modify George Orwell’s axiom that 'the great enemy of clear language is insincerity.'"

Clearly, Mr. Orwell was wrong and Will is right. As the latter explains, in reality "the enemy of clarity is the scary sincerity of progressives who are politically inflamed about everything" — and have since attempted to douse the flames with foul-tasting, aqueous English.

This general insight on the relationship between sincerity and language was more succinctly expressed 130 years ago by Oscar Wilde, who divined that "all bad poetry is sincere." Likewise, progressives are trying to be politically poetic when they toss around their weird, neologistic inventions. (Not to be pedantic, but Wilde actually wrote that "all bad poetry springs from genuine feeling." The shorter version, passed down to us through generations, is catchier, though, and thus has become the standard Wildeism.)

What I wish to alternatively touch on, however, is Orwell's ensuing observation, which was as misguided as his "insincerity" remark was mistaken. Lamented the author in his essay, "Politics and the English Language": "When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms.... [The words quoted here immediately followed his 'insincerity' comment.] In our age there is no such thing as 'keeping out of politics'. All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia. When the general atmosphere is bad, language must suffer."

The difficulty with that passage lies in two of its phrases: "In [his] age," and its generally "bad" political atmosphere. Orwell cast his lamentation in the year of 1946. That one refuge of political scoundrels was "long words and exhausted idioms" was certainly nothing new in the postwar era, as Orwell surely understood. But what of singling out that age as somehow uniquely bad in politics, along with the citizenry's inescapable involvement in it?

Which is another way of asking, Just when has public politics not been nestled in a generally wretched atmosphere? Here at home, even a cursory glance at our history and its politics reveals an uninterrupted flow of — to further condense Orwell's summary — monumental troubles. Each successive era seemed indomitable in its agonies; some, possibly the end of America as its contemporaneous residents knew it:

The embryonic nation's near collapse contained in the raging "war" between Federalists and Anti-Federalists; the antebellum era's immense, sectional tensions; the bloody bridge from tensions to actual civil war; the contentious challenge and then unforgivable shame of Reconstruction; the beastly ferment of the Gilded Age and the Progressive movement's tortured and ultimately disappointing battle against it; the penetrating pain of the Great Depression; two hot global wars; a paranoid Cold War; the oppressive McCarthy era; the embattled age of civil rights; the ominous rise of Reaganism, then its beeline to seemingly endless culture wars — and Trumpism.

Plus a gazillion other agonies amid it all: racism in each of its hideously varied manifestations, second-class womanhood, wage suppression and their combined, inexorable results of widespread socioeconomic inequality and ever-narrowing concentrations of wealth — not to mention harrowing struggles over nativism, nationalism, and imperialism.

None of this is to say, or in any way imply, that today's obscenities of Trumpism and its ghastly dangers to American democracy are to be dismissed as a kind of ho-hum affair. Both present a nearly incomparable gauntlet. But such has been the history of America: just one damn thing after another.

Orwell was misguided in believing that his era — transatlantically — was especially afflicted.

Trumpism and evangelical Christianity: To which circle would Dante have condemned both?

Atlantic contributor and Never Trumper Peter Wehner takes note of a Christianity-shattering occurrence of late: Donald Trump Jr.'s Dec. 19th address to a congregation of Turning Point USA members, which is the same as saying, Trump supporters. One portion of Jr.'s speech was truly extraordinary in its implications for evangelical Christianity.

Wehner concedes that the erratic thoughts of Don Jr. are rarely worth a bother; nevertheless, the son "has been his father’s chief emissary to MAGA world." On occasion, then, what he says is worth a listen. And what he said at Turning Point USA's gathering went far beyond the organization's principal mission, that of hardcore pseudoconservative "enlightenment" for the young. (The Chronicle of Higher Education has written that TPUSA "is now the dominant force in campus conservatism.")

After further noting that Don Jr.'s speech "displayed seething, nearly pathological resentments; playground insults...; tough guy/average Joe shtick; and a pulsating sense of aggrieved victimhood and persecution," Wehner, himself an evangelical Christian, gets to the crux of the son's delivery:

"If we get together, they cannot cancel us all. Okay? They won’t. And this will be contrary to a lot of our beliefs because — I’d love not to have to participate in cancel culture. I’d love that it didn’t exist. But as long as it does, folks, we better be playing the same game. Okay? We’ve been playing T-ball for half a century while they’re playing hardball and cheating. Right? We’ve turned the other cheek, and I understand, sort of, the biblical reference — I understand the mentality — but it’s gotten us nothing. Okay? It’s gotten us nothing." (You gotta love his "sort of" understanding the biblical reference.)

Wehner perfectly summarizes Don Jr.'s spiel: To "tens of millions of evangelicals who form the energized base of the GOP," his message was that "the scriptures are essentially a manual for suckers." Continued Wehner: "It’s worse than that.... If the ethic of Jesus encourages sensibilities that might cause people in politics to act a little less brutally, a bit more civilly, with a touch more grace? Then it needs to go."

I'm delighted that Wehner cites the ethic of Jesus instead of "morality," which is imposed on populations, is variegated from culture to culture, and thus produces ambiguity and contradictions to an endpoint of meaninglessness. Ethics come from within; there exist certain a priori, universal tenets of human decency (otherwise human society could never have come about). One needn't believe in the divinity of Jesus or some externally dictated morality to appreciate his "natural" ethical teachings, which resemble those of every major religion, each of which sprang from intrinsic concepts of goodness. (The sensible alternative — a shortcut, really — to reading the intimidating mounds of world religions' ethics is simply to read the more compact entirety of Shakespeare, who, in less than 40 mesmerizing plays, said it all.)

There I digressed. For what I wished to note with more urgency is that one of Turning Point's subsidiaries, so to speak, is named Turning Point Faith Ministries. Among its unswerving guidelines is this: "The Bible is God’s word to all men. It was written by human authors, under the supernatural guidance of the Holy Spirit. It is the supreme source of truth for Christian beliefs and living. Because it is inspired by God, it is truth without any mixture of error."

Yet there stood Don Jr. before an adoring, enraptured crowd of Turning Point's adherents cheering him on as he excoriated at least one biblical error and preached what is explicitly "contrary to a lot of our beliefs" — namely, that of ceasing Jesus' cheek turning. Because such turnings — assuming one has ever occurred — have "gotten us nothing. Okay? It’s gotten us nothing." Thus, to so many of today's evangelicals, Trumpian Christianity is as transactional as Trumpian politics — and abysmally, profoundly emblematic of Molière.

I probably should have omitted that I had digressed when distinguishing morality from ethics, inasmuch as my survey was not, in fact, much of a digression. For a new "morality" is being imposed, from above, on evangelical Christians, who stand overwhelmingly in Trump's corner. They are now to follow the earthly teachings of the Donald, Don Jr., and any other secular brute who worships at the shrine of holy Trumpism.

Can Wehner's once-beloved evangelical Christianity survive such a pragmatic beating? Hell I don't know, can't say. I will however venture that should it survive, it will do so as a permanent cripple. And that, pace Wehner, I see as a sainted upside to Don Jr.'s sermon. After its full embrace of Trump Sr., evangelical Christianity doesn't deserve to live, much less thrive.

Trump's pro-vaccine remarks? They're merely pro-Trump.

Many of the left's pom-poming stories about Trump's recent vaccination crusade strike me as hyperbolic, such as Salon's, which opens: "Devoted far-right followers of former President Donald Trump are finally turning on him." That's a broad statement — an assertion enveloping millions of Americans, effectively stripping the former president of his base.

All this speculative hoo-ha began, as you know, when Trump appeared on stage with Bill O'Reilly a few days ago, whereupon the woebegone despot proudly announced that he had gotten a covid booster shot. To this, the audience responded with boos, which, retorted Trump, erupted from only "a very tiny group" among the assembled. Shortly after that embarrassment, Trump then told far-right activist Candace Owens in an interview that "some people aren't taking [the vaccine]. The ones that get very sick and go to the hospital are the ones that don't take their vaccine.... People aren't dying when they take their vaccine."

Trump's remarks, at long last, contained something shockingly responsible — and that, of course, inflicted immense agony on some or much of his base. But there's a huge difference between some and much, which renders Salon's stirring lede — that his "devoted far-right followers ... are finally turning on him" — in doubt.

Salon notes that Trump's comments sent "alternative social media networks like Telegram and Gab into a frenzy," which, doubtless, is true. But what does that mean, in terms of numbers of users? Social media is ignored by most Americans, hence "alternative" social media is surely but a gnat on the butt of the Trumpian booboisie.

Numberswise, Salon offers up only Infowar's Alex Jones and "Stop the Steal" agitator Ali Alexander as once-devoted far-right followers of Trump. Jones said "everybody I know that used to support Trump is really mad at him." How many voters does Jones know? I've no idea, nor does Salon. Said Mr. Alexander: "Trump, stop. Just stop." That's an entreaty, not a full-scale condemnation. Last week I also posted a short video of "MAGA activist" Alison Steinberg denouncing Trump. Yet Alison's MAGA influence is as unknown as she is.

Here, though, is where we come to the interesting part. Notes Salon: "The simmering TrumpWorld civil war [another bit of hyperbole] has also had a similar effect on the community of people who subscribe to the QAnon conspiracy theory — leaving them unsure whether Trump has abandoned the anti-vaccine movement, or is simply following a plan so complicated and secret that they cannot comprehend its inner workings." We might add that Trump's committed "QAnon community" could be even smaller than the number of "alternative social media" users.

Still, there is more, and it is fascinating. Former Trump lawyer Lin Wood, who's every bit as crazy as the most devoted QAnon disciple, has benevolently signed on to the "secret," "inner workings" theory. Observed Wood on the social-media site Telegram: "I believe We The People should wait until ALL the facts are known before passing judgment on the President's wartime strategy and the tactics designed to achieve victory." Since Mr. Wood is nuts — he additionally reveals Trump as the current "Commander in Chief" — we need not linger over the inner workings of his forgiving speculation.

We also need not "wait until ALL the facts are known" about Trump's "wartime strategy." Because it's staring us in the face: It's a general election strategy.

Sure, in the primaries he'll lose some votes from the Infowars baptized, devout anti-vaxxers, and the yet-institutionalized. Trump, however, is at least smart enough to appreciate that he simply cannot credibly vie for a general-election victory on a pro-covid platform. He must begin now to abandon the craziest of the freedom-loving vaccine loathers; it's that, or no chance of ending his woebegone despotic days. Even some of the genuinely pissed off will still vote for him in both primary and general, since so many of that crowd love Trumpian authoritarianism even more than they hate Moderna.

So Trump finally said a few things that were shockingly responsible. His words, though, were typically only for his own good.

Is Omicron a good thing?

There is a certain irony, or paradox, hovering over the rapid spread of the Omicron variant in the U.S. — or so it seems to me.

The facts: The number of coronavirus cases is now higher than even that of last winter. At last week's end, confirmed cases reached nearly 200,000 daily, and that represented a staggering 65% increase over just the prior two weeks. Hospitalizations have also increased, although their statistical rise has not matched the rise in cases. This suggests the lesser severity of Omicron.

Another fact, however, is that deaths were up by 3% throughout the above period, averaging more than 1,300 a day. It would be natural to assume that the rise in deaths has corresponded to the rise of Omicron, especially since, as the Times reports, "experts warn that the surge of infections, combined with the fact that tens of millions of Americans remain unvaccinated, could still create a severe strain on the U.S. health system and lead to many more deaths."

It should be observed, however, that the variant cause of these potential deaths is not identified in the Times article; nor anywhere, that I know of, in the major press.

Which leads us to another fact, as reported by WebMD.com: The first case of the Omicron variant leading to death occurred only on Christmas Eve. And it came with its own peculiar circumstances: "The man, who was in his 50s and lived in Harris County, Texas, was unvaccinated and had previously been infected with COVID-19. He recently contracted the virus again, and it was confirmed as the Omicron variant."

In short, the 50-something man had recklessly tried to dodge covid-19 twice, and he lost. But he also had "underlying health conditions" — plus who knows the aftereffects of his first infection — which almost certainly contributed to the severity of his Omicron case. At any rate, as of last Friday there had been only one Death by Omicron.

In other words — and, I should add, so far — virtually everyone infected by Omicron, whether vaccinated or not, is undergoing less severity, which is reflected in the number of hospitalizations lagging behind confirmed cases. Meanwhile, unvaccinated Omicron-infected patients are acquiring some level — perhaps a significant level — of immunity to covid-19.

All of which suggests, to this layman, that Omicron could be the best thing to happen yet throughout this godawful plague. The rapidly spreading variant has the entire nation even closer on edge than it was a year ago, but it could be that Omicron will prove to be the killer of covid-19 itself.

As the recklessly unvaccinated acquire and overcome Omicron, immunity sets in and thus broader infectiousness diminishes and ultimately disappears.

I have not read of this possible upside anywhere. If it is an upside, epidemiologists would be enormously reluctant to note it publicly, since that would only unleash even more recklessness, more cases, more burdensome hospitalizations and, likely, more deaths, as in the case of the 50-something Texas man.

Of course I'm not an epidemiologist myself, so my theoretical thesis could be all wet. But the logic works. And if it shows to be true ... well, what irony: the virus killed itself. 

***

Update, 29 Dec.: At last, some reporting on this: "Omicron is undoubtedly becoming the dominant variant, and that could be good news: A new laboratory study carried out by South African scientists showed that people who had recovered from an infection with the variant might be able to fend off later infections from Delta." (NYT)

Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas and ...

Remember, today is also Humphrey Bogart's birthday (1899) — and there really is a Rick's in Casablanca. 

Best to all, and here's lookin' at you, kid. 

P.S.: Between readings of articles on Omicron, ant-vax morons and an overwhelmed hospital system, I'm watching Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938). I'm worried about how everything will turn out. That's the magic of film. 

A rather pissed-off MAGA activist

I don't know who Alison Steinberg really is — a Google search furnished one who's in "global marketing," from Syracuse University, so that can't be she; and another, but with two els, plus she's at the ACLU, so that sure as hell isn't she — but perhaps Alison is, in fact, a major influence as a "MAGA activist." 

Alex Jones had MAGA activist Alison Steinberg on to trash Trump over the vaccine: “If you go to his hotel in NY, you have to show proof of papers. So how can you continue to blindly defend this man? .. There’s no denying what he’s doing is evil.” pic.twitter.com/AytmkN3ggh

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) December 24, 2021

Should we hope that Alison is a big-time influence at the MAGA asylum? It's a difficult, even impossible question to answer with any real certainty. Trump could be the end of the American Experiment — U.S.A., 2025, R.I.P. — or he could be the best thing that ever happened to American democracy. That is to say, he could be so obviously, so indisputably, so innumerably annihilated in the presidential election, not even the GOP's ham-handed machinations in swing states could save his sorry ass. From there, the Republican Party would be left with no option but to reform.  

Indeed it could be, it just could be, that Ms. Steinberg is ahead of the curve — in the weirdest kind of way.   

***

It seems that Mr. Jones added: "Everybody I know that used to support Trump is really mad at him. He’s ... committing political suicide."

Garland, Trump, and time

Constitutional law professor Laurence Tribe is still at it, doggedly urging Attorney General Merrick Garland to do something about Trump's attempt at a 2020 presidential coup — and to do it quickly. His latest urging is cowritten with former federal prosecutors Donald Ayer and Dennis Aftergut, for the NY Times. For those of you without a Times subscription and would like to read the gist of Tribe et al.'s op-ed, I give you this:

Almost a year after the insurrection, we have yet to see any clear indicators that [a Trump] investigation is underway, raising the alarming possibility that this administration may never bring charges against those ultimately responsible for the attack....

The legal path to investigate the leaders of the coup attempt is clear. The criminal code prohibits inciting an insurrection or 'giving aid or comfort' to those who do, as well as conspiracy to forcibly 'prevent, hinder or delay the execution of any law of the United States.' The code also makes it a crime to corruptly impede any official proceeding....

The president himself sat back for three hours while his chief of staff was barraged with messages from members of Congress and Fox News hosts pleading with him to have Mr. Trump call off the armed mob whose violent passion he had inflamed. That evidence ... is certainly enough to require a criminal investigation.

And yet there are no signs, at least in media reports, that the attorney general is building a case against these individuals — no interviews with top administration officials, no reports of attempts to persuade the foot soldiers to turn on the people who incited them to violence....

Even our proud tradition of not mimicking banana republics by allowing political winners to retaliate against losers must give way in the wake of violence perpetrated to thwart the peaceful transition of power.... Without forceful action to hold the wrongdoers to account, we will likely not resist what some retired generals see as a march to another insurrection in 2024 if Mr. Trump or another demagogue loses.

Tribe and his co-writers concede that Garland may be investigating "behind closed doors. Justice Department policy does not permit announcing investigations, absent exceptional circumstances." If this isn't one, I don't know what is. At any rate, the authors also note that if such an investigation were indeed in progress, there almost certainly would have been leaks to the media by now.

Yet, we hear of nothing. Meanwhile, it seems that time is slipping away — and wasted time is Mr. Trump's most powerful ally.

A booster shot story

A NY Times lede: "It took Matthew Phillips four hours to get a coronavirus test. Mr. Phillips, a 34-year-old Seattle resident, spent Wednesday morning refreshing dozens of websites on his laptop until he could find an appointment. And once he did get to a testing site, he spent another hour and a half in line before it was his turn. He is now hoping he will get a negative result in time for his flight to Houston on Thursday to see his relatives for Christmas."

Mr. Phillips should consider himself lucky.

My daughter is a Seattle resident. What she needed and wanted was not a coronavirus test but a booster shot. Days ago (she works days and works many evenings as well) she was finally able to book an appointment for one — for next Thursday. Then, of course, it will be 14 days before the booster is completely effective. She's not traveling for the holidays; she merely wants to be safe and safe toward others. But from beginning to end — from booking an appointment to full anti-viral effectiveness — such safety will require an approximately four-week delay.

I post this out of no little anger, which is always a bad idea, but ...

The CDC keeps blaring to the public, Get boosted! Then, even in major urban areas such as Seattle, appointments for boosters are long in the coming. I want someone to blame but there's no one. No single government entity is identifiably responsible for my daughter's situation and that of, surely, thousands of others — not the feds, not the state, not the municipality; it's all just one huge muddle of unaccountability. Hence anger turns to a kind of blind rage.

My anger becomes especially intense when I think of all those Americans who are trying to be personally and socially responsible but can't get boosted right away, while boosters sit unused in areas where vaccine indifference thrives.

Anyway, once again, Mr. Phillips, consider yourself lucky.

Philippine typhoon relief update

My friend has an update on the typhoon relief in the Philippines to which many of you so generously contributed, at the Borjan Children's Fund, a 501(c)(3). I have been asked by some of you for the latest news — and here it is.

***

Happy news, all my kids survived Typhoon Rai! Somehow. I'm in the middle of trying to direct relief efforts from 10,000 miles away but we're making progress. The logistics of having your infrastructure blown to bits where there wasn't much to begin with is maddening. My girl on the ground who was in Manila and got headed that way? That one-to-two-day trip turned in to five days. She's there now and we're getting news and some pictures.

Two of her cousins are getting food in by shuttling supplies with a rented truck between Borjan and a town 6 hours away with a bank. Antibiotics too. Lots of people are getting cuts and punctures sifting through debris in flip flops. Clean water is available now because it's been raining for 4 days

I've asked for donations through the local paper, which has affluent readers. They've produced not one penny. Your readers kicked in over $1,000! That's about 35 fifty-pound sacks of rice for people who haven't eaten in four days. Every donation of even $20 bought Christmas food for a family of ten for several days. Givers of all amounts probably had no idea just how much good their donations did. I hope they do now. I and my kids thank all of you at the Carpentariat so very much. 

***

From Borjan Chidlren's Fund: "Maligayang pasko!" ("Merry Christimas." This is what your donations bought.)

The "Britain Last" policy

Great Britain is being battered socially and economically by the global pandemic, which can't really be blamed on Great Britain, since the pandemic is, well, global. Its economic effects are expected to be temporary, whatever "temporary" means in this seemingly endless plague. Because of government interventionist programs, mass unemployment and major business failures were avoided, and the U.K.'s economy was coming back from pre-pandemic levels, much as the world was. Ultimately, the effects of covid on the nation's GDP would be roughly — and again, temporarily — 2%, said the data.

But well before the pandemic struck, the U.K. decided to do something entirely to itself, and for the long term: Brexit. And the following, one can say, is the devastating effect of Trumplike nationalism.

In late October, Britain's Office for Budget Responsibility concluded, as one macroeconomics professor put it for the Guardian, "so far, so bad." The office estimated that "the long-term impact of Brexit will be more than twice as great as Covid. It thinks that Brexit will reduce UK productivity, and hence GDP per capita, by 4%" (emphasis, mine). Other economists put GDP loss at 6%.

This, however, was the columnist's choicest line — one on the reasonable simplicity of some economic theories, forecasts and models: "The principle that increasing barriers to trade and labour mobility between two large trading partners will reduce trade and migration, and that this will, in general, reduce economic welfare on both sides – but especially for the smaller partner – isn’t really at issue." To put that, too, in the vernacular, Duh!

Yet certain British politicians — goaded by Trump and Trumpian nationalism — promised their constituents no pain. This will be easy, they said; we'll simply replace our European trade agreement with individual trade agreements around the world. (There is still no trade deal between the U.S. and Great Britain.) Meanwhile, not one economic model could validate such a reality. If nothing else, economic theory presaged Brexit's disaster, and a disaster it is.

So there was and is covid, but its presence is not permanent. Notes the column-writing professor: "Brexit is, by its nature, a long-term issue. Just as it took decades for the UK to see the full benefits of EU membership, we’ll still be discussing the economic impacts of Brexit long after I’ve retired.... So far, it looks as if, from an economic perspective, Covid is for Christmas, while Brexit is for life."

I recall having read Brexit apologists such as Andrew Sullivan on this side of the Atlantic. All would be well, they said: "So far, so good," they said; Britain had a right to shut itself off from the world and yet somehow remain an integral part of it, they said; the British people had a right to self-determination, they said — and there, they were all-too wrongfully right. In short, nationalism would overcome. It could overcome.

I wonder what they're saying now.

Of greater concern, though, is what a return to such Trumplike stupidity would mean for the United States. Unfortunately, a large portion of Trump's stupidity is still with us: our departure from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. President Biden's hands have been tied by the congressional left, but he'd be wise to bust those shackles and rejoin the TPP. 

​​​​​The most self-centered man in American politics

The one news story I did keep up with over the weekend was on Sen. Joe Manchin's scandalous betrayal of his president, party, home state and, above all, country. To announce his betrayal on the nation's anti-democracy network was only fitting; for Joe there was no place like home: "Fox News Sunday."

When President Biden campaigned on his ability to work across the impassable aisle — a mere bobble for the bipartisanship-loving masses — I doubt he ever imagined that his real problem would be one man in his own party. Who also just happens to be a liar.

In Sen. Manchin's words, "I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation, I just can't.... This is a no." His stated reasons? Inflation, a fresh coronavirus variant, and the growing national debt. Not one of them is valid, and given all the information a U.S. senator has on hand, he knew better.

Inflation has stabilized, there are some signs it's decreasing, and the Fed — possibly prematurely — is already taking steps to rein it in. The Build Back Better plan was not economic stimulus, as March's $1.9 trillion pandemic package was often framed, and which Manchin voted for. Some of BBB's money, such as the expanded child tax credit, would go directly into people's pockets, but the rest would take time to filter through the economy, such as spending on universal preK.

Manchin's home state needed BBB's social benefits more than most, which of course are now closely related to the pandemic. In 2020, West Virginia ranked 47th in healthcare and 45th in education. His state did score well in one ranking: It had the 6th highest poverty rate — before the covid pandemic. Well done, Senator.

Nationally, with respect to the coronavirus, Sen. Ron Wyden observed: "I’m concerned that you’re going to have many, many vulnerable Americans, Americans with young children for example, falling between the cracks. January looks like a tough month with respect to omicron." Manchin's murder of BBB meant the end of federal payments to roughly 35 million American families with children. The last checks were sent last Wednesday. So, Merry Christmas, America.

As for red ink, did Manchin vote against the infrastructure bill? Did he vote against the latest defense authorization? Both of which expanded the federal debt? You know the answers. When it comes to lying's close cousin, hypocrisy, Manchin's reaches Republicans' megaproportions.

To cut Manchin some slack he doesn't deserve, some of this one-man clusterfuck is actually a threesome. I shall never understand why President Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer failed to break up the massive BBB bill weeks or even months ago, pass pieces of it throughout next year — a far simpler political challenge for Manchin (in FY2022, for instance, BBB's child care package totaled only $24 billion) — and, in the interim, work on blocking Republican efforts to outright steal coming elections.

Meanwhile, this "transformational" presidency is on hold — Build Back Better having been its centerpiece. I also never bought into that premature legacy-making. BBB was the Holy Grail of Biden's agenda; the left played it up as "transformational," and the press went along with it. But Biden's majorities were always too small, the left's eyes always too big, and Manchin was the wrench in it all.

Perhaps the president can still be transformational, however, in a defensive kind of way. If he can now persuade Manchin to jerry rig the filibuster and then deny Republicans' machinations to deny the will of voters, that would be one for the history books — a sort of anti-transformation achievement for the ages.

A final note on days past

I'm not sure how to return to this site after the loss of my son. A one-line statement of his death on Friday and then straight back to politics a day or two later seemed awkward, even cruel. Hence this, on living with grief.

First, because I know some of you on a personal level — a cherished relationship of more than just writer and reader — I believe I owe you something of a note on the why of Nathaniel's death. He died of a cancer — a cancer of the soul, I'd call it. He allowed it to go untreated and, at an early age, it caught up with him: years of addiction, ending in an overdose. I could offer a hundred reasons as to what led to his condition, but this isn't a biographical note on my son's nearly endless struggles with life, so I'll leave it at that. Any more would be intrusive, and I don't fully understand it myself. ​​​​​

I spent the weekend "processing," as they say. To me that's just a euphemism for "waiting it out." I've consumed two days of watching movies and football as effortless distractions; reading I have found difficult. One front-page NYT piece arrived serendipitously yesterday morning, however, and I read it not so much with interest as involvement.

The article was on The Myth of Closure, a recently published book by Pauline Boss, a sociologist of family science. Like so many of you, I have known close family loss before, and my experiences taught me to disbelieve in "closure." I'm not even sure what is meant by the word. Close what? Feelings? Memories? Connections? If one is human, such a permanent, artificial disconnection is impossible. Thus "closure" is a myth.

It seems the theory was originally developed by Freud, in Mourning and Melancholia, 1917. His work "promoted detachment from the deceased as a healthy grief response, and therapists following this model counseled their clients to let go of whomever they had lost," says the article. Later came the familiar five stages of grief, which the article calls a "model." It "implies that if we work hard enough and follow certain steps, we’ll be able to get over our losses within a reasonable timeline." I no more believe in five steps than I do 12. "Steps" seem to me a kind of factory-line type of reasoning, yet there is no reasoning in grief, which is purely emotional.

Instead, Boss suggested as far back as the 1970s the term "ambiguous loss." It rejects "closure" and "steps" and embraces, or accepts, irresolution. "Its haziness is the point," says the article. Says Boss: "It’s a theory about imprecision, and how do those of us who like precision live with such ambiguity." In short, her theory reworks "expectations" after a death. (It also expands far beyond personal loss, reaching into societal grief, such as that which follows deaths inflicted by centuries of racism.)

I found two elements of Boss' work particularly, and personally, striking. One is a question: "Can you grieve a foreclosed future?" — particularly apt in my son's situation. The other is a recommendation: ["One should relinquish] one’s desire to control an uncontrollable situation" — also particularly apt. Nathaniel's existence was, by others, simply uncontrollable. He was, in the end, the navigator of his own fate, notwithstanding certain vastly unfortunate, external circumstances that influenced it. That's a hard thing to say, but it's about all I can say in my acceptance of something so ungovernable. That, and I loved him, of course. And that, I can never let go.

I'll spend one more day of hazy, imprecise "processing" of this acceptance. Then, back to work.

I just received news that my son from my first marriage died today. I'll probably be offline for a couple days.