For all the latest news all the time, check out the 24/7 website the Walking Duck.
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I’m trying my best for all y’all.
Today is the 361st day of 2021 and this is the 361st edition of Wide World of News, reported and written just by me every day of the year, with no journalistic or institutional support at all.
And no advertisements, unless you count these here incessant requests that you consider becoming a voluntary paying subscriber or contributor pronto.
I know what many of you think:
Why should I pay for something I can get for free?
Or
I will eventually get around to kicking in some cash money to support the cause.
My replies are, respectively, (1) Because, c’mon, man; and (2) The future is now.
Please become a paying subscriber here:
Or become a voluntary contributor by sending a simple email to markhalperintalk@gmail.com and asking how you can arrange to give any amount of your choice.
Thank you, one and all (except, so far, the balky millionaires and billionaires who read daily for free; I know who you are).
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So what happens when I consume all the wide world of news to make the Wide World of News and there isn’t much?
As in: The lead political story on the Washington Post website at this hour is two days old and the lead op-ed piece on nytimes.com is three days old.
So I do this:
Here’s the Big Idea I had on Sunday that I want your help in making a reality.
What can we do collectively to make this January 6 a day of national unity, rather than a day of further division?
I’m no Cassandra, Carnac, Nostradamus, or Toffler, but I am pretty sure I know what is about to happen.
The events around the upcoming anniversary will rip us apart further.
All the known incentives for the loudest voices on the national town square will be to treat this solemn day as another opportunity to polarize.
Let’s not let that happen.
Many of you will say that I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one.
I’m going to listen to your ideas, think more on it, and try to make this a reality.
As with many ideas about grappling with polarized America, this one is simple but/and challenging.
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NEWS
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GOOD NEWS
American consumers spent at a brisk pace over the shopping season, as an early rush to stores amid worries about supply and delivery problems muted the effects of a Covid-19 surge that disrupted some businesses and crimped spending before Christmas.
U.S. retail sales rose 8.5% between Nov. 1 and Christmas Eve compared with the same period last year, according to Mastercard MA 0.87% SpendingPulse, which tracks sales in the Mastercard payments network coupled with survey-based estimates for cash and checks. That is the strongest growth in 17 years, but slightly below Mastercard’s estimate of 8.8% growth that it published in September. Compared with 2019, sales were up 10.7%. The tally includes online purchases and spending in restaurants but excludes automotive sales. (Wall Street Journal)
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BAD NEWS
Dale Weeks’ family believes he was an indirect victim of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The retired Iowa school superintendent died in late November, nearly a month after he was diagnosed with sepsis, a dangerous, blood-borne infection unrelated to the coronavirus.
His daughters think he might have survived if he’d been admitted immediately to a large medical center, where he could have received advanced testing and prompt surgery.
But he stayed for 15 days at Newton’s relatively small hospital because the bigger facilities said they couldn’t spare a bed for him, his family says. Iowa’s short-staffed hospitals have been jammed for months with patients, including people severely sickened by COVID-19.
“It’s infuriating that people who are not vaccinated are clogging it up,” said Jenifer Owenson of Des Moines, who is one of Weeks’ four children.
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EXPECTING NEWS
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ENTERTAINMENT NEWS
Name these three mega stars:
If the pandemic cancels “The Music Man” revival, there will be trouble in Gotham City – with capital “T” and that rhymes with “P” and that stands for “pandemic.”
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TWO ESSENTIAL READS WITH THREE THEMES EACH
A. A Washington Post op-ed piece by Representative Pramila Jayapal calling for the enactment of the BBB agenda.
The trio of themes you will hear headed into 2022 and beyond:
1. Progressives want Team Biden to do a lot via executive actions.
2. Progressives think doing well in the midterms requires passing a massive version of BBB.
3. Progressives are not likely to sell the bipartisan infrastructure bill as a grand accomplishment.
B. The Wall Street Journal on the bipartisan efforts to pass laws in 2022 regulating Big Tech.
The trio of themes you will hear headed into 2022 and beyond:
1. Democrats want to see Joe Biden more involved in fighting for legislation on a range of issues.
2. What major legislation on any matter can possibly pass in 2022 is a wildly open question.
3. Big Tech’s lobbyists believe that chaos, indecision, ignorance, and the clock/calendar are their friends (and they are correct).
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FOOD NEWS
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CORRECTION
In Sunday’s edition, I wrote “sights” when I meant “sites” and I am still living with the unfathomable implications of the error, which I regret significantly.