As Pete Seeger used to sing, “It takes a worried man to sing a worried song.” As for me, I admit it, I tend to worry about things.
For example, I am really worried that 73 million Americans saw fit to vote for Donald Trump for president. I mean, how could that be? Clearly, the guy was and still is a mean, malevolent human being. He is a racist, bullying, lying divider who took great delight in bringing us to our worst inner places. Still, he was nearly elected president for a second time, and maybe would have been had there not been a pandemic. It really worries me that it is so obvious what a horrible man Trump was (and still is), yet all of those people still voted for him and might vote for him again if he runs in 2024. Every human being is a mixture of good and bad parts and I am worried that we just came very close to the bad winning, big time.
I also worry about illness. There are a thousand ways that our bodies betray us. We all die, even doctors. Medicine, as far as it has advanced, still has tremendous limitations. We may be on the verge of breakthroughs involving genetics and all kinds of other wondrous things, but we are not there yet. So, when we have stomachaches, the mind asks, “Is it a stomachache or is it cancer?” We get dermatitis and we may think it’s something much worse, so we get to a dermatologist if we can find one. I know a guy who had a black toilet and was worried because he couldn’t see whether his stool was black, a sign of cancer.
The Internet may help, but it may also make things worse. You look up that rash and ask for images and you think that you’ve got it nailed, but when and if you get to a certified skin doctor, they tell you it is something entirely different than what you found on Dr. Internet. In the end, though, it is a terrible truth that something will get us. We are going to die, each and every one of us. Maybe we are living 10 years longer than our parents, but soon people will be living into their hundreds. Unfortunately, we may will not be among them.
I am worried that our democracy is a shell of what it was when it was established by our founders. Now we see people purposely changing the rules on voting so that their candidates will win. That really is the end of democracy in this country. The name of the game now is to have Republican state legislatures like the one in Georgia change the rules so that Donald Trump’s attempts to steal, fix, or rig an election will be legal the next time. The next time he runs, he hopes that what Republicans are doing in several states will be made legal. The next time he demands, “Find me enough votes” to steal an election, it will be possible. That worries me a lot.
I am worried that, thanks to the Supreme Court and the Citizens United case, lobbyists and big money campaign people will soon have such influence that politics is now a fixed or rigged game of the rich. Just think of it. Politics just may be for sale. Andrew Cuomo is said to have received $4 million as an advance for his latest book. That’s incredible. I wrote a much better book about Cuomo’s father, “Me and Mario.” Trust me, I really don’t remember if I got anything monetary out of the deal. I was just happy that it was published. So why should a governor get $4 million? That ain’t right. Of course, at the time that the deal was struck, Andrew was riding high, saying that he was going to run another time and maybe even thinking about the presidency. Hmmm.
