Columnists

The evening of November 3rd had a rocky start; it initially appeared that 2020 was to be a reprise of 2016 -- that Donald Trump would, once again, defy the odds and steal the presidency. Then the tide turned, Biden won Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan. By Friday we learned that Biden had probably won Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and Pennsylvania. On Saturday, the Biden-Harris ticket prevailed. But not by the margins Dems had hoped for. -more-

Begging—and Hyperventilating—for Dollars

There's one thing I won't be missing now that the election cycle is over: the oscillating emotional rhetoric of email fund-raising pitches.

On one side of the emotional spectrum, campaign fund-raisers verged on hysteria: "We're begging!" "We're devastated!" "It's Over!" "We're Crying!" "We're Wrecked!" "We're Panicking!"

On the other side, the alerts boomed with bravado: "Trump Terrified!" "Mitch McConnell Crushed!"

And, within minutes of each other, two pitches arrived from astronaut Mark Kelly's Arizona senatorial campaign. One read: "Mark Is Surging!" The other read: "Arizona Is Slipping! Mark Kelly Is Down!"

The pitches were still coming in well into the late afternoon of Election Day. One of these—an e-pitch from Jamie Harrison, who was contesting Lindsey Graham's critical Senate seat—took a refreshing approach. The subject line read: "Humbly Asking." -more-

Thankfully, Joe Biden has finally been declared the winner of the presidential election. Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will be the first woman, the first Black woman, the first Indian-American woman and the first daughter of immigrants to be sworn in as vice president. -more-

When I write my columns, I hope that I am not getting excessively preachy or excessively autobiographical. However, this week I am talking about myself as the main subject. -more-

It was a relatively quiet week for Berkeley City meetings, all things considered, which means there was only one City meeting at a time. Monday was a test of endurance with one meeting after another, which pales in the challenge of the rest of the week to stay focused between toggling back and forth between election vote counts and Worldometer’s daily count of new COVID-19 new cases. The pandemic is raging and California is not escaping. Just two weeks ago the California seven-day daily average of new cases was 3300. Now that number is 4740. Johnston Medical is out of medium Moldex N95 respirator masks and Moldex has told them not to expect any more. Worldometers reported 132,540 new cases on Friday. -more-