Two Countries-- Lots Of Antipathy-- Falling Apart

 

The U.S. reported 108,389 new cases of COVID today-- and another 1,201 deaths. Early tomorrow the U.S. will cross the 240,000 deaths mark, a memorial to the worst president in history, soon to be the ex-president. You know how sometimes the living presidents all get together for something or other? Do you think Carter, Clinton, Bush and Obama would ever invite Trump to one of those?

Now, can you guess which backward hellholes were Trump's strongest bastions yesterday? These were the states where he has the biggest percentage of votes-- along with the number of COVID cases per million residents:

• Wyoming- 69.9% (25,994 cases per million residents)
• West Virginia- 68.6% (14,500 cases per million residents)
• Oklahoma- 65.4% (32,290 cases per million residents)
• North Dakota- 65.0% (63,382 cases per million residents)
• South Dakota- 64% (56,283 cases per million residents)
• Idaho- 63.1% (38,227 cases per million residents)
• Kentucky- 62.7% (25,295 cases per million residents)
• Arkansas- 62.7% (38,376 cases per million residents)
• Alabama- 62.3% (40,336 cases per million residents)
• Tennessee- 60.7% (39,507 cases per million residents)

And what about the enlightened states? These are the 5 where Trump got the fewest votes:

• Massachusetts- 31.1% (23,692 cases per million residents)
• Vermont- 31.7% (3,633 cases per million residents)
• California- 32.9% (24,112 cases per million residents)
• Hawaii- 34.3% (10,928 cases per million residents)
• Maryland- 35.1% (24,607 cases per million residents)

George Packer's Atlantic essay talked to something many of us are thinking-- "We are two countries, and neither of them is going to be conquered or disappear anytime soon." Don't you wish we weren't part of the same country they are? Last night I was so despondent-- not about Trump but about the assholes and morons who voted for him that I was considering moving back to Europe.

Packer wrote that the election outcome is "a pretty accurate reflection of the American electorate. The much-discussed Democratic majority that’s been emerging since the turn of the millennium is still in a state of emergence and probably will keep on emerging for years to come. The will of the majority is indeed blocked by undemocratic rules and unscrupulous politicians, but it’s a bare majority without enough numbers to govern. When America finally becomes the promised land dominated by tech-savvy Millennials, its political values will be far from certain."

And this is why I felt like leaving America again: "Tens of millions of Americans love MAGA more than they love democracy. After four years of lawbreaking and norm-busting, there can be no illusions about President Donald Trump. His first term culminated in an open effort to sabotage the legitimacy of the election and prevent Americans from voting. His rallies in the final week of the campaign were red-drenched festivals of mass hate, autocratic self-absorption, and boredom, without a glimmer of a better future on offer-- and they might have put Trump over the top in Florida and elsewhere. Even as 'freedom-loving people' came out in unprecedented millions to vote, their readiness to throw away their republican institutions along with their dignity and grasp of facts suggests that many Americans have lost the basic qualities that the Founders believed essential to self-government. There is no obvious way to reverse this decline, which shows signs of infecting elements of the other side as well."

There’s no escaping who we Americans have become: This is the election’s meaning. We are stuck with one another, seeing no way out and no apparent way through, sinking deeper into a state of mutual incomprehension and loathing. The possible exits-- gradual de-escalation, majority breakthrough, clean separation, civil war-- are either unlikely or unthinkable. We have to live and govern ourselves together, but we still don’t know how. Winning in this state becomes a chimera. Whoever takes the presidency, all Americans will remain the losers.