The Fog of War?

No, it’s crystal clear. Vladimir Putin has started a war, all by himself, without provocation. In fact, Ukraine, and the West in general, bent over backwards not to provoke him.

Russia will now be subject to a rash of new economic sanctions. The Russian people will suffer, but Putin won’t. For him, it’s not about money. Instead, it’s about some messianic conviction that it’s up to him to return Ukraine to Mother Russia.

In an earlier comment, I was hard on President Biden for comparing what then was a potential invasion of Ukraine to World War II. I was saying, when will these old men stop living in the last century? But that’s where Putin is, back in the USSR. The comparisons to that 80-plus-year-old war are ringing true. And what really hurts is, this new war is so unnecessary.

Ukraine is thousands of miles away from here, and many will ask, why should we care about it? Because this conflict will affect most of us indirectly, at least, as we fill up our gas tanks or check our 401(k) balances. The Ukrainians will suffer directly and horribly, as that is what comes when Russia invades.

It is becoming clear that there is only one language, besides Russian, that Mr. Putin really understands. And from whom will he hear it? First, the Ukrainians themselves, who are not going to fold up in the face of this aggression. Then from the US and our European allies. Sanctions may only be a first step. We have done everything we can to avoid a wider war, but we can’t be afraid of it either. We heard Mr. Putin remind us that Russia is a nuclear power. If that’s even in his consciousness, he’d better start thinking about which hill he wants to die on. I think he has already made the mistake that could eventually prove fatal to his leadership of Russia.

Many have said that the US can’t be the “policeman of the world,” especially since we haven’t been very good at it in recent years. But the world desperately needs a police force. There are autocrats and military regimes all over the globe, oppressing the people within their own borders. We may not be able to deal with all of them. But when one country invades a peaceful neighbor, a line is crossed, literally and figuratively. That cannot go unanswered. 

 

More Than Just Games

 

I enjoy the Olympics in general. But I’m just not qualified to watch some sports, like Big Air snowboarding. I can’t tell just by looking at the TV whether the athlete completed a 900 or a 1440, or whether they grabbed their boards properly in flight. It all went by so fast and had to be explained by expert commentators.

Then, of course, there is figure skating. I can’t skate five feet without falling on my rump, so the demonstration of incredible artistry by an Olympic competitor is other-worldly. But with all the effort that goes into an individual skating routine, why does it seem to be all about tricks? I need the commentators again to explain triple axels, toe loops, saichows, and quads, which also go by really fast, and you know, I don’t care who will be the first woman to perform a quint.

I don’t have much new to say about 15-year-old Russian skater Kamila Valieva and just who is to blame for her positive doping test. But is it just me, or was all the explicit live coverage of the reaction after her final disastrous performance on the ice almost intrusive? I guess we had to see it, but I was squirming.

And I don’t understand this whole Russian Olympic Committee business anyway. If the Russians were banned from the Olympics for a period because of doping, then it should have been a total ban, without this work-around.

Another thing I question is how athletes can choose to perform for countries other than their own. If you were born in the US and are therefore a citizen, have grown up here and continue to live here, you should be on the US team. Skier Eileen Gu has done wonderful work introducing her sport to young women in China, and she is an admirable human being. But she’s an American. Heck, she could be President someday. I wish those medals she won had been American and not Chinese.

I do agree with the notion that the Olympics should be politics-free. It’s not possible, of course, to completely disentangle politics from the event, but those ideological battles can and will be fought before and after the Games. The Olympics are actually a nice distraction, or can be, and in their own way, they help hold the world together.

There are many things about the Olympics that need attention , such as how host cities are selected, the way athletes are trained and whether there should be age limits,  and how critical decisions are made during competition, as in the case of Valieva. But now in their third century, the Games do have a place on our planet.

 

The Fourth Quarter

Sorry for the football reference here, but hey, the Super Bowl is almost upon us. Dare we ask it: is the end of COVID close too?

A while ago, one of those cable TV medical pundits said, if I heard him right, that we could be looking at only around 50 new cases a day by April. States and localities are beginning to drop mask mandates for vaccinated people. Of course, there is always the possibility of a new variant appearing, and yes, there is much discussion about living with COVID as an endemic illness.

But even the Spanish Flu of the last century had an end. So, what if our long national nightmare is about to be, for all intents and purposes, over? Like the groundhog coming out of its burrow earlier this month, what will we see, and do?

I thought, giant mask-burning parties. But maybe that’s not a good idea – we can’t forget about all that smoke and climate change. I would say, keep a few masks around in case of a new outbreak, or at the very least, as souvenirs for your great-grandchildren,  or save them for that house painting project.

At some point, it will dawn on many people that the economy is actually pretty good and that they’re sitting on a pile of disposable funds that they might want to spend before inflation and rising interest rates gobble any of it up.

But the pandemic, even if it ends, will not end at the same rate for everyone. While many of us suffering from COVID fatigue will want to get right out there, I suspect that others, especially in families that have lost a member to the virus, may be a little more cautious.

Right now, if you’re in a supermarket line in a liberal state, you’ve seen how those not wearing masks have been shamed or shunned. Will that someday happen in reverse? Some may not be ready to go shopping without masking up. Will the bare-faced in the new majority take offense? As in, what’s the matter with YOU?

Finally, the woulda, coulda, shoulda game will turn into shouldna. Like, our mass lockdowns were unnecessary, the disease mainly affected old and obese people, the experts were wrong, etc. I think the experts were learning as they went along, just like the rest of us, except they at least had the expertise to evaluate what was going on. I hope there is a national commission to list the lessons we need for the next time, and there will be a next time.

But I, for one, will be especially grateful to see those footprint decals on the floor go away!