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In your view, have recent events changed the way people around the world view your country? If so, can you give any examples?
This large encampment of tent dwellers is in a park in my town right next to the county governmental office building. I think people around the world are shocked and dismayed, as I am, at the increasing number of unhoused people in this country, and the rise in extreme income disparity. People once viewed the USA as a prosperous country where poverty and wealth inequality were less dire than most countries, a place where a full time worker could afford to live comfortably. Now scenes like this are common in many cities and towns across the country. We have increasing numbers of people living in tents next to streets where Teslas and other signs of wealth are a regular sight. People who once envied us now shake their heads in disbelief and comment that this used to be a much better place.
October 22, 2021
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What was the biggest news story this past week -- either in your community, nationally, or globally?
Nationally, the conviction of Derek Chauvin in what we hope will be the trial of the new century. As I have written elsewhere, some justice was done--with the emphasis on some, since there is so much more still to be done as far as racial justice in this country. Internationally, there is the current horror going on in India, with a new surge (with a new, more deadly variant), that has people dying like flies--some expiring at the doors/gates of the overfilled hospitals. And the crematoria are going 24/7, bringing rather horrid thoughts of something else--even when cremation is thoroughly in the national cultural tradition. And only now is the U.S. moving to send oxygen, protective equipment, supplies--and the AstraZeneca vaccines that we've basically been sitting on since they're not approved for use in this country. It is a most sobering reminder of how "over" this pandemic is not in some parts of the world, and how our country helping out is not only the right thing to do, but could be necessary for our own survival.
April 28, 2021