By Tom Burke
So who’s feeling completely overwhelmed? Who’s wondering how to deal with crisis-piled-on-crisis, real versus “fake” news, TV pundits, and the White House tweets ending decency, civility, truth, tradition and leadership?
Clearly it’s not just the warp-speed pace of news, but some lump of something has gone critical-mass-kaboom and there’s so much detritus flying at us our ability to absorb and process is red-lining.
So in no particular order, lets look at the “news” and see what keeps our heads spinning:
North Korea’s nuclear-armed, with an unstable leader (your choice which).
Thirteen million people losing health insurance.
Medicare for cancer victims being zeroed out.
An accused pedophile running for the Senate and endorsed by the president because a child molester is better than a Democrat.
The Republican tax cut benefits the upper class and costs everyone else trillions.
The deficit’s never been bigger and grows by another $1.5 trillion to fund tax cuts for the rich.
Eight-hundred thousand “Dreamers” are up for deportation.
The Middle East is exploding because campaign politics trumps real diplomacy as the president moves our embassy to Jerusalem.
Net neutrality is dying and Comcast, Verizon, et al now controls the internet.
Global warming is real.
Eliminating the Children’s Health Insurance Program puts 400,000 families in the health-care dumpster.
There’s a volcano in Bali. It’s exploding.
The Russians massively tampered with our elections.
L.A. is going up in flames.
The president again says Obama was born in Kenya.
If the federal government shuts down, it’ll cost us $6.5 billion a week.
The Arctic National Wildlife Preserve is again in danger, from Zinke.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which recovered $12 billion from cheating banks, is being killed.
There’s an opioid epidemic killing 170 a day, we’re doing squat about it.
The new tax bill kills mortgage deductions; reduces charitable giving by $20 billion, and eliminates deductions for state and local taxes.
The tax bill’s benefits for the middle-class sunset in ten years while the uber-class keeps its in perpetuity.
The deal keeping nukes out of Iran is being torpedoed by the president.
The tax bill, touted as revenue neutral, isn’t. It adds $1.5 trillion to the debt.
Our staunchest ally, Great Britain, pooped on the president for retweeting anti-Muslim, fictional ravings of a fringe-fascist, neo-Nazi UK hate group.
A member of the president’s voting commission is suing the commission for keeping its meeting dates and proceedings secret.
The Republicans’ “Starve the Beast” philosophy raises deficits and lowers tax revenue to kill Social Security and Medicare.
The president used a racial slur, calling a sitting U.S. senator “Pocahontas,” in front of three Navajo WWII “Code Talkers.”
Puerto Rico is still on its butt and no relief’s in sight.
China becomes ever-more-powerful as the president diminishes the U.S. role in Pacific trade and world affairs.
Hackers stole personal data from Experian (143 million), eBay (145 million), AOL (92 million), Anthem Health (88 million), Target (110 million), MySpace (143 million), and more.
#MeToo has identified a senator, two House members, Hollywood’s biggest producer, the “Today” show’s host, an NPR star, a PBS star, a candidate for the U.S. Senate, and the president of the United States as sexual predators. (Only the President was actually recorded bragging about grabbing women by their genitals.)
Failure to enforce existing gun laws (even by the U.S. Air Force) has killed hundreds.
Midwest farmers will be crushed if the president pulls out of NAFTA, as threatened.
Our armed forces are at their lowest manpower level in seven years.
After 16 years in Afghanistan there’s no solution in sight, or even a plan.
The Wall is still on the fence.
Two million acres of national monuments could be opened to development.
The president’s former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about Russia.
A Trump Campaign foreign policy advisor pleaded guilty for lying to the FBI about Russia.
The Trump campaign’s manager, Paul Manafort, has been indicted for money laundering.
The State Department has been gutted when the alternative to diplomacy is nuclear war.
Critical American infrastructure continues to crumble (despite the president’s pledge to fix it).
The president believes the best way to make peace with North Korea is by calling its leader a “sick puppy” and “little rocket man.”
Most corporate leaders say new tax savings will go to corporate profits not business growth.
The new, hastily-passed tax cut is so riddled with fatal flaws it may sink in Congress.
Finally, the world’s biggest Starbucks, at 30,000 square feet, was opened in Shanghai. It’s twice as large as it’s prototype in Seattle (hey, Shanghai’s population is 24.15 million) and there are no reports of bikini baristas.
And that’s just the national, top-line stuff. Then there’s state and local, crime, business, entertainment and sports news.
“Enough already,” as we used to say in the Bronx.
Tom Burke’s email address is t.burke.column@gmail.com.
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