[BUCHANAN.ORG] "’Hope’ is the thing with feathers / That perches in the soul," wrote Emily Dickinson. "And sore must be the storm / That could abash the little Bird / That kept so many warm."Staring ahead on New Year’s Eve, at what appear to be the coming storms of 2022, this once-hopeful country is going to have to fall back on its reserves.
What storms?
Suddenly, the omicron variant of the coronavirus (aka COVID19 or Chinese Plague)
...the twenty first century equivalent of bubonic plague, only instead of killing off a third of the population of Europe it kills 3.4 percent of those who notice they have it. It seems to be fond of the elderly, especially Iranian politicians and holy men...
is sweeping the nation, shutting schools, shops, restaurants and bars that were only lately reopened. In this last week of 2021, new infections twice set records.
Is a fifth wave of the pandemic arriving, just two years after the first wave hit in March 2020?
What is hopeful here?
While the numbers of infected are exploding and deaths are rising anew, the omicron variant appears to be less severe and less lethal than the delta variant — and possibly less enduring.
From the medical community one hears the hope that the omicron variant could displace the delta and, as has happened in South Africa, burn itself out.
Still, if the present rate of infections and deaths continues, we could have a virus-related million American deaths by spring.
A second storm is economic, with inflation now running at 6.8%, the highest rate since the last days of Jimmy
MalaiseCarter
...peanut farming former nuclear sub officer, who succeeded Gerald Ford as president. Carter perfected the approach later used by Joe Biden to get elected, presenting himself as a moderate whose Zero-based Budgeting was going to so away with the federal deficif. Once in the hands George McGovern's rejects, who were ever so much more virtuous than the rest of us, the nation immediately spun into a Malaise®. By the time
Jimmeh,as he was contemptuously referred to, was running against Ronald Reagan, the liberal columnists were pronouncing the nation's problems as too severe to be solved by anyone; they were simply unsolvable, or maybe insoluble. That was why Reagan was such a flop. After Obama, Jimmeh's's only the second worst president ever, and by the time Biden's done maybe the third. Depending on how many Dems we elect in coming years, he may even end up looking competent...
and first days of Ronald Reagan.
Should this trend continue, inflation could be crushing to President Joe
The Big GuyBiden
...46th president of the U.S. You're a lyin' dog-faced pony soldier. Of course Corn Pop is a real person....
’s party and presidency next November. And, according to Thursday’s Washington Post, that may be what is coming:
"Strong consumer demand, continuing supply chain troubles and the emergence of the omicron variant of the coronavirus threaten to prolong sharply rising prices well into 2022, potentially making inflation the premier economic challenge of the new year."
As for U.S. economic growth, forecasts for the first quarter of 2022 are being cut back from 5.2% to 2.2%.