What I loved, however, about JLo and Gaga and, later, Katy Perry giving us full-blown celebrity grand malarkey in a quite tense political setting is that it was, at least to me, a joyful infusion of bedlam in a space where, for so long, all the bedlam has been so joyless. I don’t feel like it’s an indicator of an old world returning—that can’t be the objective—but I took it as a reminder that some of the better, weirder, let’s get louder things of the old world might carry over into the new world that I hope we’re making.
There has never been a more dangerous speech by an American President, and it remained to be seen if his party’s leadership would, at last, abandon him.
Is he really the most dangerous or just the most obvious? Inviting people into the undemocratic project we generally ignore.
More LGBTQ candidates ran for office in the United States in 2020 than ever before – at least 1,006. That’s a 41% increase over the 2018 midterms, according to the LGBTQ Victory Fund.
A tranquil election is of course unlikely. There have been continuous nationwide protests over racism and police conduct since May. While most have been peaceful, there have been some violent confrontations, assaults on federal property, and looting. Extremists at both ends of the political spectrum have sought to provoke violence. Exhausted, apprehensive, and angry police have on occasion overreacted. It is hard to imagine that this turmoil will suddenly end on Election Day.
The will be protests after Election Day. The question is: how will they change us?
With either outcome [to the upcoming U.S. presenting election], dangerous myths about American political culture will remain unchallenged, left as assumed truths and conventional wisdom created by throwing uncomfortable facts down the memory hole.
Should Biden win, it is imperative that we use the four-year-window his election provides as an opportunity to lock in systemic change.