Suffer The Little Children

 A week after the riots in our nation's capitol that helped make everything about 2021 look like an extended dance remix of 2020, my son entered the room and announced, "I've been alive for three quarters of our country's impeachments." A quick check of dates allowed that he has, in fact, been on this planet for the impeachments of Bill Clinton (once) and Donald Trump (twice). None of us in the room had any personal recollection of Andrew Johnson's back in 1868.

But I remembered Watergate. And Richard Nixon. And Haldeman and Erlichman and all the President's Men. The events of the summer of 1974 live in my memory and profoundly shaped my political outlook moving forward. From the age of twelve. Nixon was not impeached. He left the White House on Marine One in one of the most stellar examples of "You can't fire me, I quit!" that could ever be imagined. 

That was nearly fifty years ago. At that time, the war in Vietnam was ending, and that was the reference I had for national suffering prior to the upheaval that brought us Gerald Ford. President Ford will probably be best remembered for giving Chevy Chase a career, and for pardoning former president Richard Nixon. It was that four to six year period that made me the cynic that I am today. 

Not that I don't still look for silver linings, or make excuses for those who I admire. But when I think of what it must be like to be a young person at this point in history, I shudder. Not just a little. The past four years have been nothing but a betrayal of all those ideals put forth in the eight before that. The face of American politics is now one of shame and disgrace. American casualties from our involvement in Vietnam capped out at just under sixty thousand. American casualties from COVID-19 stand just below four hundred thousand, while that number continues to rise with thousands more dying each day. Anyone celebrating their first birthday this year will have lived through half the impeachments of an American president, and the greatest loss of American life - compared to all our wars combined - in our history. 

I suppose it makes sense that my own reaction to the events of the past few weeks has fueled my already somewhat jaundiced view of our political landscape. But it has also given me hope. The victories in Georgia and the ceiling shattering election of our first woman of any color to the second highest office in our land should mean something. They are an example of resiliency, one of our nation's super powers. Convincing a twelve year old of that, or my twenty-three year old son?

Time will tell.