Author: sbarzilla

“Depression is feeling like you’ve lost something but having no clue when or where you last had it. Then one day you realize what you lost is yourself.” —Unknown

On the heels of my New Year’s resolution we come upon a few stories that have circulated over the past month. My response to these stories used to be anger. I would rant and rave about this and that to my friends. I suppose I may do some of that, but the reality is that I am just more sad than anything. There is a feeling of hopelessness that is just overwhelming.

The first story involves the all too familiar. There was yet another mass shooting this weekend involving an AR-15. So, why the sadness? Obviously any senseless and arbitrary loss of life is sad. If you aren’t sad then you are probably angry. If you are neither of those things then your humanity is slowly slipping away.

Of course, that’s not why I am sad. I’m sad because we will go through the cycle of thoughts and prayers, ringing of garments over easy access to guns, the ensuing arguments over what AR stands for in the AR-15 and whether that even matters in the question of whether anyone should own one. We will argue about whether it’s guns or mental health and of course those that argue mental health will offer absolutely zero ideas of what to do about it. Someone else will say we shouldn’t politicize this tragedy and that the time to address these things is some undeterminable time in the future. We will wait several weeks and then there will be another one almost like it.

The second story that brings sadness is the continued arguments over COVID treatment and vaccines. At this point, it is not an argument I want to participate in. Are these vaccines dangerous? Ineffective? Are the over the counter or prescribed treatments effective? These are all important questions and they are questions I don’t have answers for. I’m not a medical doctor.

It is the fact that these things are being debated in political circles at all that is the depressing thing. We have medical experts. There is a learning curve for them just like there is for us in our chosen profession. As they learn more, treatment improves. It is the same cycle for any other disease we have discovered. Politicizing science is just so damned depressing.

Finally, we get to the George Santos/Matt Gaetz/The Former Guy portion of the proceedings. I suppose we can throw in the Bidens just for fun. At this point, this shouldn’t be difficult. If you committed a crime you should go to jail. That includes the Bidens. As we know, there is no proof of a crime on their part, but that’s usually when these things break down. In these other cases we know full well. In some cases there are four or five different jurisdictions standing around and wondering if someone else will relieve them of their burden. They just hope that some court, some prosecuting attorney, or the grim reaper himself will just fix it.

Add these all up and you can hopefully see why the anger and outrage has shifted to depression. Things just seem to be getting worse. Things just seem to be hopeless. The only solution/advice I have is that paying attention only feeds the hopelessness. Maybe it is time to unplug for awhile.

“I can be someone’s and still my own.” — Shel Silverstein

Those of you that know me know I’ve used that quote before. It is one of my personal favorites. At a certain point, we get to an age where things get to us more easily. I read that story every year to teenagers when they prepare for Confirmation. I get choked up every time I read it.

I know a lot of people that have new year’s resolutions at the ready on the first. It takes me awhile. All of this came into focus when I perused twitter and encountered yet another of those patented “I don’t understand how you could vote for…” and it occurred me that we are hearing this more and more often these days.

The obvious point is that it shuts down our collective discourse. It puts us into one side or another and determined that the other side is just a group of village idiots. So, my new year’s resolution is to raise my level of discourse. I will certainly still challenge individual members of the herd. It’s hard to avoid doing that these days, but I will do my red letter best to avoid transferring that to a whole ideology.

This brings me back to Silverstein. The line above obviously is directly related to the story it came from (“The Missing Piece”) but it is one of those rare lines that can stand on its own. As a writer I’m jealous. All of us want one of those lines at least once in our life. There was a time when I thought I could be a speech writer. Occasionally, my writing drifts that direction and when I read lines like that it stirs me to try again.

America is a unique place. It always has been. It combines the mythos of rugged individualism with a community feel where we do what we can to help each other get along. We can be someone else’s and be our own at the same time. So, our body politic must tow the line between a collectivism the rest of the world embraces and an individualism that numerous tout.

When we dial away party politics we get to a point where we each have our own personal take on where that balance rests. There used to be a day when Democrats and Republicans could set aside differences and meet in the middle of particular issues. I suppose it still happens under the rarest of circumstances. It is the ultimate difference between statespeople and performance artists.

Obviously, I’m just a teacher so my thoughts and words have little to do with what actually happens in government. However, it can impact what happens in my little corner of the world. It can impact my personal relationships. It can impact the level of angst I feel on a daily basis or my level of optimism for the future.

I can be my own and someone else’s at the same time. I can manage my own happiness and practice a certain level of autonomy while allowing others to help me whenever I need assistance. I can be that helping hand to others when they need emotional or physical support. We can collectively be our own and each other’s at the same time. We can remember that our own personal belief of where we stand on that continuum between collectivism and individuality does not define us as a human being. Our humanity must exist beyond that and so we cannot allow ourselves to get bogged down in the “I can’t understand how you can vote for….”

The disappointing thing is that we know we will. I know those words will leave my lips or get typed out on my screen. I know this. Ultimately, new year’s resolutions have to be aspiratational. We know we likely won’t reach those goals, but we have to try. We have to try to do better.

“I know nothing stays the same
But if you’re willing to play the game
It’s coming around again.” — Carly Simon

These get worse and worse every time you hear them. The victims get younger and younger and the shooters more and more alarming. This time it was a six year old that purposefully brought a gun to school and opened fire on his teacher. She survived the shot and hopefully will make a full recovery. Who knows if the 25 year old first grade teacher will want to teach again.

These stories involve the worst parts of our collective humanity and yet they involve incredible acts of heroism. The victim had the presence of mind to successfully get most of the class outside the classroom. When she saw that she didn’t get everyone she went back for the rest. She deserves all of the medals and honors that any of us can bestow on her.

I began teaching in 1997. I was a mere 23 year old teaching kids as old as 18 and 19. Looking back, I shudder at how inept I was. I knew the material and did the best I could to deliver it, but nothing prepared me for the challenges teachers encounter every day.

Over the years, I have had numerous successes and numerous failures. Yet, there was never a time when I seriously thought one of my students would want to hurt me. I certainly think some of my ex-students were capable of hurting others. I even had one student I worked with that was charged with murder. I’m not sure how that case is doing at this point.

No one goes into education expecting to make millions. My parents would regale us with stories about how they sold glass bottles back to the store to scrape the pennies necessary to buy groceries. Movie theatres would give them discounts and other businesses would as well. It was just understand that teachers would struggle.

This is one of those deals where people in both parties talk about how teachers should make more. Obviously, some think we get enough already. I live a comfortable life. I could complain, but I really shouldn’t and can’t with any intellectual honesty. I’m not turning down more money, but money is not the biggest area of concern.

The biggest area of concern is how a six year old can get their hands on a 9 MM handgun and why they would feel the need to shoot their teacher. The rhetorical questions have answers, but none of them are satisfying. The other area of concern is to somehow reconcile the reverence people have for teachers and yet people outside the classroom interject their values and prejudices into it. Either you trust us with your kids or you don’t.

I don’t think any kid really wants to shoot me, but I also don’t give them any reason to do it. Some teachers are more confrontational. Some teachers are more strict. That’s not my job, so I’m fortunate. Those teachers may have to be those things because it ultimately helps the kids in the end. I wouldn’t be foolish to say every teacher has the best interest of kids at heart. It’s an indefensible statement. Yet, that is the default position until proven otherwise.

We don’t need door control. We don’t need a cop in every hallway. We don’t need to wear bulletproof vests or arm the staff. What we need is common sense measures that will keep a six year old from having a 9 MM in his possession. It’s just one area where the rest of the world looks our way and scratches their head. We know what’s causing this and we know how to stop it. That’s only if we are being intellectually honest.

“Never interfere with an enemy while he is in the process of destroying himself.” — Napolean Bonaparte

I have a tiny piece of advice for the Democrats. Of course, you probably need more than twelve people to read your ramblings regularly in order for them to stand up and take notice. However, in case it does get out, here is my plea: just stand back and don’t say a word.

As I sit here, Kevin McCarthy has failed to gain the speakership after eleven ballots. The last time this happened (1923) the eventual speaker was elected after nine ballots. So, McCarthy has made history. Congratulations Kevin. Democrats have had their pictures taken with popcorn and thoroughly enjoying the whole spectacle. Tread lightly Democrats. The Republicans are disintegrating before our very eyes and you don’t want to be anywhere near them when they do.

No one likes a bully and no one likes someone that laughs at someone else’s misfortune. There is a time when the joke has gone on long enough and everyone wants to move on. The people see what is going on and the longer it goes on the less people need for anyone to spin it. The House of Representatives literally cannot govern until they elect a speaker and which each passing day the symbol becomes more and more emboldened.

Republicans are not interested in governing and they really can’t govern. Of course, one leads to the other, but I couldn’t tell you which one of those comes first. Think about Texas Republicans. They keep complaining about how liberals have ruined the state. They have been in power for 30 years. They’ve controlled the legislature, governor’s chair, and lieutenant governor’s chair every day this century. Yet, they blamed the power outage on renewable energy. It’s like the chef that goes to the market, buys the ingredients, preps the food, and then cooks the food blaming the meal on someone else.

They at least can seat leadership. The House can’t even do that. Democrats passed numerous bills over the past two years with narrow majorities in the House and an even Senate. During the Trump years they literally passed only one landmark piece of legislation in four years.

So, just stay out of the way. Do not call any attention to yourselves. Don’t get caught enjoying the moment too much. The American people will learn a painful lesson before too long. Republicans are not serious actors and they won’t get any serious policy ideas from them. They are performance artists, carnival barkers, and frauds. The people will see it. You don’t have to break your arm pointing it out to them.

“No man ever went broke overestimating the ignorance of the American public.” — P.T. Barnum

One of my loyal readers (one of the seven) and I engaged in a brief discussion over the antics of Skip Bayless. For those not into sports or sports commentary, Bayless has been a carnival barker for decades that essentially made it as a troll before there ever was something called the internet. Others would call them shock jocks or provocateurs.

My first introduction to Bayless was when he was on ESPN. They used to have a show called “The Sports Reporters” where heavyweight (or just heavy) journalists would come on and debate the issues of the day. The cast would run the gamut including award-winning authors Mitch Albom and Mike Lupica to Bayless and child molester Bill Conlin.

Bayless once insinuated that Troy Aikman was gay as a prominent journalist that covered the Dallas Cowboys. This was in the 1990s when there were no prominent gay athletes and very few prominently gay celebrities. Besides, it wasn’t true and even if it was a horrible way to go about breaking that sort of news.

That seems somehow fitting today as Bayless finds himself in hot water over a tweet following Damar Hamlin’s gut-wrenching injury. Hamlin is apparently doing better and hopefully will be able to leave the hospital at some point. Who knows whether he will ever resume his career and at this point that is nowhere on anyone’s radar.

Bayless’s tweet (which I will not show) appeared to question why the league was canceling the game or how they would resume the game. It appeared to show some concern for Hamlin, but was worded poorly and seemed insensitive at the time. As my friend pointed out, there was no reason to tweet that at all. No one cared about the game in that moment and most sports leagues would have handled it the exact same way. You deal with the issue at hand and worry about ramifications much later.

The point to all this is that some public servants and some commentators are desperate to be the story. There is a fine line between gaining fame by being a trusted voice to comment on the story of the day and gaining fame by being the story of the day. This yet another time when Bayless becomes the story. People are calling for him to be fired, but more will watch in the meantime. Color me surprised.

In all fairness, Bayless isn’t the only guy doing this. Stephen A. Smith is just another example of a guy that does this. Perhaps we round them all up, put them on the same show and see who can garner the most attention. That way, the rest of us can just avoid that show and listen to more thoughtful commentary.

“Do my crying and my sighing
Laugh at yesterday?” — Brian Wilson

I was having one of those discussions with my daughter. She is at the age where I’m trying to teach her some more complex concepts. A part of it is preparing her for a complex and sometimes frightening world. Another part is simply building her vocabulary. So, I had her look up “nihilism” on her phone.

Nihilism is “the belief that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated.” So, in other words there is no objective truth. There really is nothing of value and there are no moral absolutes. Dealing with people that truly believe this is a lonely and frightening existence. Leadership based on this isn’t really leadership at all. Yet, this is where we are.

The new Congress is trying to elect the new Speaker of the House. Candidates have to have 218 votes in order to be Speaker. Technically speaking it doesn’t even have to be a member of Congress. I suppose it could be a member of the minority party, but that would be theoretical at this point. In simplest terms, you simply keep voting until you find one.

Kevin McCarthy is supposed to be the new Speaker of the House. He has gotten as many as 201 votes in the elections from the past two days. As I write this, there have been four separate ballots and there is no speaker. This is the first time this has happened since 1923 when it took nine ballots to elect a new speaker.

Watching the modern Republican party is a real life lesson in governing philosophy. Traditional conservatives decried what became known as moral relativism. As best explained, that would be the concept that no one person’s moral compass would be superior to someone else’s. However, that is still far different than nihilism.

McCarthy’s behavior over the last few years is a perfect example. He decried the January 6th attacks until he didn’t. He opposed extremism in his own party until he didn’t. He has tried to be all things for all people and is discovering that you really can’t. Someone that will stand for nothing will fall for everything. I’m quite certain that I read that somewhere.

Ultimately there is a difference between believing there is one objective truth and believing there is one objective truth for you. There is a difference between allowing new information and life experience to change your moral compass and never having one in the first place. There is a difference between engaging other people with a different moral compass than your own and engaging someone that believes nothing.

I have said this before and I’ll say it again. This is why the Republican party is dying. Conservatism isn’t dying. Major philosophical planks can’t really die. Parties die when they have nothing at their core. Power is not a core belief. Attention is not a central tenet of any governing philosophy. Politics cannot be transactional for very long. If you stand for nothing you will fall for anything. Grab the remote and pop some popcorn. The death of a major political party is something to behold.

“You have to be trusted by the people that you lie to
So that when they turn their backs on you,
You’ll get the chance to put the knife in.” — Roger Waters

I remember it like it was yesterday. It was the first election that I ever voted in. Obviously, the headliner was Bill Clinton vs. George Bush, but there are always intriguing down ballot races and these are the ones where the most bizarre stories would come from. It was the election where I was introduced to Lena Guerrero.

She had a promising political career for awhile. She served in the Texas Legislature and had been on the Texas Railroad Commission. She was now running to be the head of the Texas Railroad Commission. It’s not an insignificant position. It involves a whole lot more than just trains. She was a Democrat and therefore seemed destined to get my vote.

Unfortunately for her, the news dropped before the election. She said she had a honors degree from the University of Texas. In fact, she had no degree at all. Unlike more recent events, those facts came out before the election. It would be the only race where I explicitly voted against a Democrat. The funny thing is that this is still true to this day.

I don’t know what makes people do these things. It’s not like she simply said she had a degree. She could have listed any institution or none at all. She could have simply said she had a degree and left the rest of the details purposefully vague. Nope. She had to say it was a degree and a degree with honors from the University of Texas. These are easy enough details to check out.

As everyone knows, George Santos is the latest to get caught up in a web of lies. Of course, to call it a web would likely be generous. His lies haven’t even been all that coordinated. The explanations haven’t been that coordinated either. He didn’t get a degree where he said he did. His background in terms of ethnicity and religion has been either falsified out of thin air or tremendously exaggerated. His work history was also falsified. Even the details of his personal life are a work of fiction.

I mention Guerrero for what should be obvious reasons. She was a Democrat. She lied about her education. She had attended UT. She just didn’t graduate. She not only lost the election, but she never participated in politics again. It is easy to make the point that one party lies more than the other. Maybe that’s even true, but that’s not the point of this particular screed. The point is that we deserve better.

The people that represent us in city hall, county court, the state legislature, state offices, and in Washington should be the best among us. They should be made from the finest parts of our national character. It isn’t necessarily about degrees, past positions, or anything else on a resume. We should be able to trust that whatever is on that resume is something you’ve actually done. We should be able to trust that what you say you know and what you say you are good at you are actually good at.

George Santos perpetuated a fraud on the people of his district. Nothing substantive that he has told the voters about himself has turned out to be true. Now, maybe he still wins. We know full well that most voters pull the lever (figuratively) for the party and not the individual. Yet, occasionally something so shameful occurs that people don’t. I didn’t vote for Lena Guerrero and I still wouldn’t.

The remedy in these cases is not as easy as you would think. It isn’t simple enough to simply redo the election. Sure, voters probably would vote differently now that they know the truth, but that sets up a dangerous precedent. When exactly do we know that a fraud has occurred and that it is so egregious that another election should be held? Sure, Kevin McCarthy and the GOP shouldn’t seat him. Yet, they have a very narrow majority and losing even one seat is a bitter pill to swallow. I don’t know the answer for them. I know the status quo is untenable. Maybe they simply don’t give him any committee assignments. The likely result is they just hope we forget. I’ve never forgotten Lena Guerrero. I’m not likely to forget George Santos anytime soon.

“Clowns to the left of me
Jokers to the right
Here I am stuck in the middle with you.” — Gerry Rafferty

The debate over Abbott’s stunt with the migrants brought a lot of thoughts to the forefront. The standard response I have seen only usually comes from those that want to charge Greg Abbott with a crime. It seems they think he purposefully endangered their lives and they seem to be under the impression that this constitutes a crime. I don’t know where they would get that idea from.

Of course, the other standard fare is to point out of hypocrisy of it all. You have a group of people that strut around and broadcast how Christian they are, but they do stuff like this. We’ve talked a lot about low information voters a lot, but we haven’t talked a lot about low information Christians. The pews are full on Christmas day of people you don’t recognize. They haven’t been there before and they likely won’t be back next Sunday. You know what I’m talking about.

It’s a touchy subject. I don’t want to shame people that just came back to church because you want them to feel welcome and you want to see them again. However, these are the same folks that loudly announce they are Christian and have very little idea of what that means. They are the ones pulling the lever for a GOP that thinks they are the party of Christians and yet don’t have a whole lot in their platform that resembles the Christianity I know.

You see, this is the spot where I differ with most liberals and progressives. I am a devout Catholic and I am a committed progressive. I am not progressive in spite of my Catholicism. I am progressive because of it. Our Lord and savior was a refugee. This is not a symbolic or philosophical point. He was quite literally a refugee. When King Herrod aimed to kill him, Joseph and Mary fled to Egypt. An angel tipped them off and they were welcomed in an unknown land. Maybe welcomed is a strong term, but they certainly weren’t hassled and they weren’t bussed to Kenya because the pharaoh wanted to score cheap political points with his base.

Those that have read most of these know a few things. They know I care about issue framing. To put it simply, the phrasing you use to talk about issues matter. How you sell yourself matters. Most people consider themselves to be people of faith. They may be what we lovingly call “Chreasters” (Christmas and Easter) but they respond to language couched in those vague terms. So, when you jettison that from your political language and move away from that then they assume those values are foreign to your movement.

In order words, if faith is a bad thing and secular humanism is a good thing then I cannot support progressivism if I am a person of faith. In point of fact, I can and I should. If I pay attention to what Jesus taught us then I can’t help but be progressive. I can’t help but be in favor of making the immigrant or refugee’s life better. I can’t help but support policies that help the poor make their lives better. I cannot help but support disparate communities and groups of people. This is all a part of Christ’s message.

This isn’t to say that you have to be Christian to be progressive. You can believe in those things and follow any faith or no faith at all. That’s not really the point to all of this. The point is that most people do follow that or at least they think they do. Yet, if they sit in the pew only once or twice a year they won’t know that the GOP’s version of Jesus isn’t the real one. They will only know if you tell them. They will only know if you give them an alternative.

“The warden said “The exit is sold”
If you wanna way out Silver and gold.” — Paul Hewson

I’m obviously late to the party with this one. As everyone knows, Governor Greg Abbott sent his own version of a Christmas gift to Kamala Harris when he sent upwards of 50 migrants in a bus to her Washington D.C. residence. I can easily go in any number of directions here and most of them are visceral emotional reactions to the story. Most of these visceral responses are the kind of responses that MAGA folks want us to say. It’s almost like a Pavlovian response. They do something outrageous and we respond with outrage, Mission accomplished.

So, where I choose to go from here is to a place where I am going to assume that one or more of them might stumble to this place and actually read these words. The regular readers already know this stuff, so you can treat this as more of a tutorial for other people. However, it is something I feel I need to say because I’ve seen the responses from both sides. Progressives respond with outrage as I suppose they should. Conservatives usually say something to the effect that Kamala Harris and Joe Biden need to solve the problem.

Let’s start with the outrage. All of us know about trolls. Essentially, mainstream conservatives are becoming an endangered species. In their place are what I lovingly call performance artists. If you think back to the scandals concerning the National Endowment for the Arts you will remember the different exhibits that caused so much consternation. There were sculptures of Jesus made out of dung or Jesus being submerged in human urine. These were all designed to create a visceral reaction. All forms of art are created to elicit a reaction. So, these maneuvers by Greg Abbott and Ron DeSantis are created to elicit an emotional response. Again, mission accomplished.

Performance artists aren’t interested in solving any problems. Problems exist to be exploited. They exist for fund raising. They exist for sound bytes. They exist so that you can frighten your base by expanding and distorting the truth. Greg Abbott has no issue in solving immigration. He has no interest in helping migrants. He has no interest in adjusting policies so that the strain on our institutions and budget are alleviated. Of course, it could be credibly claimed that many progressive politicians aren’t interested in solving the problem either. They can fundraise against Abbott and DeSantis as easily as those two can fundraise themselves.

This brings us to the second point. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris can’t solve this issue on their own. It’s a problem with the low information voters. This is an issue that must be addressed in Congress. So, you can send these people to the White House or to Kamala Harris’ private residence, but the stunt doesn’t provide them any additional incentive to solve the problem. Harris literally has very little real power to do anything beyond helping those exact people. This is where you call or write letters to your elected representative asking them to work with other members of Congress to actually pass comprehensive changes to our immigration policy.

Whether one considers this just performance art or an act of cruelty, the end result is just the same. Someone decided that jerking these people around was better than actually helping them. At this point, I’m not going to judge if someone decides they can’t help them. I understand. We can’t help literally everyone that needs help and it can be hard to decide where that cut off should be. They are human beings. They deserve better than this. If we can’t help them then the least we can do is not hurt them. It’s one thing to have a sculpture made out of dung to enrage the masses. It is something else entirely to use actual living and breathing human beings for your performance art.

What is particularly jarring is seeing the standard messages sent out this time of year when our elected officials wish us a merry Christmas and happy holidays. These messages are usually wrapped in some sort of sanctimonious bullshit about how we all need to be better people. Sure, you first. Whether you really are that black-hearted or you are just playing an asshole for your performance art really doesn’t matter. It’s a distinction without a difference. Our Lord and savior wouldn’t do this. Worst of all, I think deep down they know this.

“Toys in the attic, I am crazy
Truly gone fishing
They must have taken my marbles away
Crazy, toys in the attic he is crazy.” — Roger Waters

Okay, I have a confession to make. This probably makes me a bad Democrat and a bad progressive, but I need to get it off my chest. I have never voted for Hunter Biden. What’s more, I will never vote for Hunter Biden no matter what he’s running for. It’s a character thing for me. Maybe that makes me a hypocrite. After all, George W. Bush was a recovering alcoholic and alleged drug addict and millions voted for him. Of course, I wasn’t one of those but I have to admit that I saw him differently. He was clearly in recovery and had been for decades. We can’t be too sure about Hunter Biden.

What’s more, I am willing to acknowledge that he has gotten multiple opportunities in life that 99 percent of people in other walks of life would never get. He has made more money and put in more positions of prestige than anyone deserves. Maybe he should have served some jail time for his drug habit. Of course, I have never really been big on dolling out jail sentences for addicts, but I suppose fair minded people can differ on that point. Simply put, he will never get my vote.

The funny thing is that he has never been on a ballot. He has never held any position within any presidential administration in the United States. He is currently a private citizen and is likely to remain that for the rest of his natural life. If he’s committed a crime then he deserves to go to jail. I don’t know that the current president has ever said differently, but maybe he has and I’m just not aware of it. Maybe he has the location of Jimmy Hoffa, the real story behind the JFK assassination, and the location of aliens on his laptop, but I tend to doubt it. Maybe that laptop holds the key to inflation, the price of gas, and the secrets to solving the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Maybe it’s just a damn laptop.

Somehow, Hunter, his drug problem, and his laptop didn’t make it on Twitter in the summer of 2020. Apparently, there were tweets about this that were taken down or not published for some nefarious reason. Somehow this “scandal” amounts to an affront to free speech and the kind of cheating that means the 2020 election was stolen. Yet, and I’m just spitballing here, no one that was undecided at the time gave a hoot about his laptop. Maybe no one that was undecided gave a crap about Hunter Biden. Maybe it was because Hunter Biden wasn’t on the ballot, but again I’m just spitballing. Maybe it was because they still haven’t proven a damn thing about why I should care. Maybe it was because we looked at the two candidates and decided that no matter what had happened with Joe Biden’s only surviving son, he couldn’t be worse than the worst president in the history of the nation. Of course, I’m just spitballing here.