And So it Goes (November 15, 2016)

The girl is on a roll. We welcome back Sehr Wenig for an encore. May there be many more to follow—the editor

At the beach Sunday morning, a man stood with his back to the ocean, FaceTiming with family. "I love you," he said again and again in heavily accented English and the high, tight voice people use with children. "Goodbye. Goodbye. I love you. See you soon," he said.

I made my way past this handsome man wearing $1200 black leather Berluti tennis shoes and a Prada jacket, with a yarmulke somehow attached to a large bald spot.

When I passed him again on my way back up the beach, the man pointed to my nearly-full trash bag and asked, "Why are you doing that?" 

"I'm tired of being sad about the election and need to do something positive."

"You’re sad about the election?"

"Yes. Very."

"Why? There’s hope in America again!"

"Hope?" Bagnell Dam burst inside my chest. "I had breast cancer this year. If they repeal Obamacare and allow insurance companies to refuse coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, I will be uninsurable if I lose my job. And it's not just me. Twenty million will lose health care entirely. Millions more will be vulnerable. That's not hope. And health care is just one issue. Hundreds of other issues will hurt millions of others."

"Sorry," he said in a voice that dripped with not-at-all-sorry.

I moved down the beach, filling yet another bag with trash and wondering why a wealthy man—who clearly loves his family and is devout enough to cover his head out of respect for God—is not compassionate enough to care about people whose lives may be damaged by Trump’s presidency. 

A few hours later, Donald Trump appointed Steve Bannon—a man whose “news” organization publishes a steady stream of anti-Semitic and white nationalist rhetoric—his “Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor.” 

And so it goes.