MARK ROGER BAILEY

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Pandemics Converge

The US presidential election is over - except for the defeated leader’s desperate grip on power and the followers who enable him. Ballot-counting in some of the US Senate races continues. And run-off elections are weeks away, so the campaigning continues, although fortunately at a lower temperature and intensity for most Americans.

We are a nation at war with itself for the spoils of its two centuries of progress, its brand, and its soul. Our experiment in democracy is still more art than a science; few of our defining accomplishments can be replicated and result in the same outcome. We are a community of individuals responding to an unprecedented alchemy of competing needs, fears, and furies. It is as if multiple viruses have formed an Axis-type alliance against democracy, America, and human idealism. Let’s hope that this war is brief, we learn from our better angels and never allow such darkness to gather again.