Brace for Impact!

2025-01-12 · 2 min read

That’s the best three-word summary I’ve yet heard for the days ahead under a new administration, expressed by NY Times columnist Patrick Healy. Lego dinosaur

As we try to keep our heads down and our chins up, wondering how we got here and how it may end, here’s a short list of hazards we probably should have paid more attention to before boarding:

  • Narcissistic personality disorder.
  • Lessons from the Gilded Age and the Robber Barons.
  • The wedding of religion and nationalism.
  • Appreciation for civics (and its cousin, civility).
  • Logic and reason.
  • The common good.
  • Media manipulation.

I think it’s pretty safe to say that “unprecedented” will characterize much of what will transpire in the days ahead.

I wish I could forecast what historians may write decades hence about these times, but I won’t be around by then.

Meanwhile, I’m buckling up, trying to comfort myself and loved ones, holding on tight for a soft landing in hopes of arriving at that “more perfect union” our ancestors dared believe was possible.

BB
Jim Hannah

Dad's short bio goes here.