Joy and sadness

 So, yesterday I took the day off from blogging -- sort of -- as I was watching the election results.  They were quite mesmerizing; GOP wins in VA, almost winning in NJ, a much more redder electorate.  It is surprising (these were solid blue states a year ago) and also not (historically, of course, off-elections tend to go against the WH incumbent), though certainly the "inside straight" trope that seems to get played every time worked well here. I think it IS correct to say that Youngkin did split the needle between "Trump" and "not Trump;" to be sure, aided by McAuliffe and his gaffes (the parent talk didn't help). Also...did the GOP let one go in NJ?  No one saw a close one, but would have thought that a few million -- or some visits by anybody -- should have been considered.  Oi.

In other news, my laptop isn't charging and I think I need a replacement.  I mean, the thing is old, and certainly should be upgraded.  On the other hand...well, one does hate to spend the money and I will need to get all of the old stuff transferred to the new one, and that takes time.  So that sucks.  On the other hand, considering the use I get out of it, assuming it lasts four years, it is like 50 cents a day or something ridiculous, so I should complain less.

https://ritholtz.com/2021/09/deficit-bullshit/

https://awealthofcommonsense.com/2021/10/the-united-states-has-been-going-broke-for-decades/

I think these are largely true, but 1) just because it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean it can't happen now and 2) the issue of course that we could spend the money better on other things, or, God forbid, giving it back to the people.

https://www.19fortyfive.com/2021/11/reconstruction-the-war-the-army-lost-that-changed-america-forever/

Quite true, and I have been saying this for years...of course, part of the problem was that the people really didn't want to fight another war, for one, and two, the usual practice of "cutting the army to the bone after the war ends" was certainly done in the Civil War, so even if we had wanted to fight the southern insurrectionists, we couldn't; hell, we could barely contain the Native American tribes, and that was a smaller and technologically backward population

In other news, I finally got around to watching "Harriet," the story of Harriet Tubman's life (as told by Hollywood).  And....I liked it; I think it was a bit restrained in portraying the horrors of slavery, but it certainly did a fine job of showing the complexities of free/slave society during the time.  Quite good overall, and certainly worth a watch or two...