November 3, 2020: Joe Biden Is Elected President

November 3, 2020: On that day, in my usual blog, Uncle Mike's Musings, I wrote, "This may turn out to be the most important day in American history. Vote like the whole world depends on it. Because it might."

Joe Biden was elected the 46th President of the United States, defeating Donald Trump. It wasn't called for 4 days, because several key States were close. It wasn't certified by Congress until January 7, 2021. It was supposed to happen the day before, but this was one of the few times that it was ever in doubt. And there was an unprecedented attempt to prevent it. That attempt failed. It was finally made official on January 20, Inauguration Day, when Biden was sworn in as President.

Biden won 81,268,924 votes, to Trump's 74,216,154. Biden won 51.3 percent of the popular vote, to Trump's 46.9, and 1.8 for scattered other candidates. Each major-party candidate won 25 States, with Biden also winning the District of Columbia and 1 Electoral Vote in Nebraska; while Trump also won 1 Electoral Vote in Maine. (Maine and Nebraska allow their Congressional Districts to vote separately from the State as a whole.) Biden won 306 Electoral Votes, to Trump's 232.

Biden won nearly all the close States: Arizona by 10,457 votes, Georgia by 11,779, Wisconsin by 20,682, Nevada by 33,596, New Hampshire by 59,277, and Pennsylvania by 80,555. However, if Trump had won all of those States except Pennsylvania, with its 20 Electoral Votes, Biden still would have won.

Trump won the white vote, 58 percent to 41; but lost the black vote, 87-12; lost the Latino vote, 65-33; and lost the Asian vote, 63-36. He won Protestants, 60-39; but lost Catholics, 52-47, despite his opposition to abortion; lost Jews, 76-22; and lost people who professed no religion, 65-31. He lost gay people, 67-30; and straight people, 50-48.

Voting by age was interesting. People old enough to remember the police bashing antiwar demonstrators in the 1960s and 1970s, and old enough to need Social Security and Medicare, would seem to lean Democratic. But many people get more conservative as they get older, and prefer to see police beating up protestors.

So Trump won people age 65 and up, born 1955 or earlier, by 52-47; and people 50-64, born between 1956 and 1970, by the same margin. These were people for whom the defining Republican President was Ronald Reagan. Trump lost people 40-49, born between 1971 and 1980, by 54-44; 30-39, born between 1981 and 1990, by 51-46; and 25-29, born between 1991 and 1995, by 54-43. These were people for whom the defining Republican President was the failed George W. Bush.

Trump lost people 18-24, born between 1996 and 2002, for whom he was the defining Republican President, the only Republican to be in charge of the economy since they were first eligible to go to work, by 65-31.

Kamala Harris became the 1st female, the 1st African-American, and the 1st Asian-American to be elected, and later the 1st of each of those to serve, as Vice President of the United States. The Democrats kept control of the U.S. House of Representatives, and gained a 50-50 split in the U.S. Senate, which becomes a 51-50 majority in the Democrats' favor -- except that 2 Democratic Senators, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kirsten Sinema of Arizona, have often stood in President Biden's way when it came to his agenda.

Among the new Senators elected were Democrats John Hickenlooper of Colorado, and Georgia's Raphael Warnock (the pastor at Martin Luther King's church in Atlanta) and Jon Ossoff; and Republican Tommy Tuberville of Alabama.

Tuberville beat Democrat Doug Jones, a civil rights lawyer. Tuberville had been the head football coach at the University of Mississippi, and then at Auburn University. I had figured that he had no chance, because Auburn fans would vote against him because he was a lousy coach, and University of Alabama fans would vote against him because he'd coached Auburn. But Tuberville appealed to religion, guns, and white supremacy, and won.

In the end, Biden didn't win because 250,000 Americans had died from COVID-19 -- a total since quadrupled, though Biden's efforts have held it down to less than it would have been if Trump had stayed in office. He won due to the get-out-the-vote effort in the key States, whose apparatus was already in place before COVID.

Biden won because he was the opposite of Trump. Because, while Trump appealed to bigotry and anger, Biden appealed to what Abraham Lincoln called "the better angels of our nature." Because he wanted to bring America healing, which is what America wanted. Because he spoke to "the soul of America." As he, a Catholic, is a student of St. Francis of Assisi, who is believed to have said:

Where there is hatred, let me sow love.

Where there is injury, pardon.

Where there is discord, union.

Where there is doubt, faith.

Where there is despair, hope.

Where there is darkness, light.

And where there is sadness, joy.

In contrast, as a man named Anthony Citrano wrote of Trump, 2 months before the election, "It's almost impossible to believe he exists. It's as if we took everything that was bad about America, scraped it up off the floor, wrapped it all up in an old hot dog skin, and then taught it to make noises with its face."

Conservatism, still led by Trump, is a darkness. Liberalism, currently led by Biden, is a light. And, for now, America wants light.

The editors of Time magazine usually name the winner of the Presidential election as their Person of the Year. For 2020, they named both Biden and Harris.

Having only James Buchanan before him, Biden is easily the greatest President born in Pennsylvania. He is the only one with a connection to Delaware.

Due to his long political career, actors have played Biden since well before he became President. In 2016, Greg Kinnear -- who has also played the only other Catholic to become President, John F. Kennedy -- played Biden in Confirmation, about the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill conflict. On Saturday Night Live, he has been played by Kevin Nealon in 1991, as the Thomas-Hill conflict was ongoing; Jason Sudeikis from 2007 to 2017, Woody Harrelson in 2019, John Mulaney in 2020, Jim Carrey in 2020, Alex Moffat in 2021; and, in the 2021-22 season, James Austin Johnson has played both Biden and Trump.

Shortly before the election, an episode of the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History featured "Nice" Peter Shukoff playing Biden, and "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist playing Trump.

UPDATE: On September 6, 2025, Biden announced that his Presidential Library would be built in his home State of Delaware, although he got no more specific than that. The State's largest city, Wilmington, has offered the Daniel L. Herrmann Courthouse as a potential location. From 1916 to 2002, it served as Wilmington City Hall, and New Castle County's Administration Building and Courthouse. It is currently used as offices by a law firm.

*

November 3, 2020, like all modern American Election Days, was a Tuesday. The baseball season had ended. Football was in midweek. And, due to COVID pushing things back, both the NBA and the NHL were still closer to the finish of their 2019-20 seasons than they were to the start of their 2020-21 seasons. So there were no scores on that historic day.

October 11, 2020: Celtics 17, Lakers 17

Pictured: Not "social distancing."

October 11, 2020: The Los Angeles Lakers clinch the NBA Championship, beating the Miami Heat, 106-93 in Game 6 of the NBA Finals, at the COVID-19-forced neutral site -- the "bubble," where the entire NBA Playoffs were held, in front of no paying fans -- of the AdventHealth Arena in the Orlando suburb of Bay Lake, Florida.

It was the 4th NBA Championship, and the 4th Bill Russell Award for the Most Valuable Player of the Finals, for the 3rd different team, for LeBron James. He had previously won with the Heat in 2012 and 2013, and with the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2016. Of course, he had engineered his shift to the Lakers, after abandoning the Cavs for the 2nd time after the 2018 Finals. There was no bitterness that time, because he had finally won them a title.

It was also the 4th title for 40-year-old Udonis Haslem, who was LeBron's teammate on the 2012 and '13 Heat, and who also won with the Heat in 2006. It's the 3rd title for Danny Green, who beat LeBron, Udonis and the Heat in the '14 Finals for the San Antonio Spurs, and won in 2019 with the Toronto Raptors. It was also the 3rd title for JaVale McGee, who beat LeBron's Cavs with the 2017 and '18 Golden State Warriors.

It was the 2nd title for 4-time All-Star Rajon Rondo, who previously won with the 2008 Boston Celtics. It was the 2nd title for Quinn Cook, who was on the '18 Warriors. And it was the 2nd title for J.R. Smith, the Lakewood, New Jersey native who won with LeBron and the '16 Cavs, but was a target of ridicule for his mistake in the '17 Finals.

It was the 1st title, at any level, for the Lakers' head coach, Frank Vogel. It was also the 1st title for 34-year-old 8-time All-Star Dwight Howard, 27-year-old 7-time All-Star Anthony Davis, 35-year-old never All-Star Jared Dudley, 30-year-old never All-Star Markieff Morris, and for Kostas Antetokounmpo, younger brother of 4-time Milwaukee Bucks All-Star Giannis Antetokounmpo, who had yet to reach an NBA Finals. (He won it all the next year.)

Rondo became the 1st player ever to win titles with both the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers. Clyde Lovellette had won titles with the Celtics and the Minneapolis Lakers.

McGee and Quinn Cook joined Jamaal Wilkes as the only players to win titles with both the Lakers and the Warriors, regardless of what cities those franchises played in. (The Warriors played in Philadelphia from 1946 to 1962, and the Lakers in Minneapolis from 1947 to 1960.)

LeBron and Danny Green (2014 Spurs and 2019 Raptors) joined John Salley (1989 and '90 Pistons, 1996 Bulls, 2000 Lakers) and Robert Horry (1994 & '95 Houston Rockets; 2000, '01 & '02 Lakers; 2005 & '07 San Antonio Spurs) as the only players to win titles with 3 different teams. Haslem joined Salley and Tim Duncan (1999, 2003, '05, '07 and '14 Spurs) as the only players to win NBA titles in 3 different decades.

Rondo joined A.C. Green as the only players to win an NBA title in one decade, not win one in the next, and then win one in the next. His 12-year gap between titles exceeded Green's 11-year gap (1988-2000), and was 2nd all-time only to that of Sam Cassell, his teammate on the '08 Celtics, who had also won with the 1995 Houston Rockets, 13 years earlier.

Finally, in this, the NBA's 74th and longest season, the Lakers tied the Celtics for the most NBA Championships, 17:

* Celtics: 1957, '59, '60, '61, '62, '63, '64, '65, '66, '68, '69, '74, '76, '81, '84, '86 and 2008.

* Lakers: 1949, '50, '52, '53, '54, '72, '80, '82, '85, '87, '88, '2000, '01, '02, '08, '09 and 2020.

Meaning that 2 franchises have won 34 of the 74 NBA Championships, or 46 percent of them. Throw in the 6 titles won by the Warriors, the 6 won by and the Bulls, and the 5 won by the Spurs, and that's 5 teams winning 69 percent of the titles.

For comparison's sake, here was the ratios of the top 5 teams in the other 3 sports at that time:

* MLB, starting with the 1st World Series in 1903: Yankees 27, Cardinals 11, Red Sox 10, Athletics 9, Giants 8. That's 65 out of 117, or 55 percent. So, even with the old domination by the Yankees, the MLB was more equitable than the NBA.

* NFL, starting in 1920: Packers 13, Bears 9, Giants 8, Steelers 6, Patriots 6. That's 42 out of 100, or 42 percent.

* NHL, starting with the 1st Stanley Cup won by a current team, 1916: Canadiens 24, Maple Leafs 13, Red Wings 11, Bruins 6 and Blackhawks 6. That's 60 out of 103, or 58 percent.

Of course, the 1st 5 Laker titles came in Minneapolis, so, really, the Celtics still led, 17-12. The next-closest teams were the Bulls with 6 and the Spurs with 5.

And the Lakers and Celtics have faced each other in more NBA Finals than any other matchup, 12: The Celtics winning in 1959, '62, '63, '65, '66, '68, '69, '84 and 2008; and the Lakers winning in 1985, '87 and 2009.

James and Davis were named to the NBA's 75th Anniversary Team a year later.

However, this was, without question, the most asterisk-worthy title in NBA history. It was unlike any other season, and any other Playoffs. There wasn't home-court advantage for anyone. From 2008 to 2012, including their 2010 title, the Lakers won 5 straight Division titles. In the 10 years after that, here is where they finished in the Western Conference: 7th, 14th, 14th, 15th, 14th, 11th, 10th, 1st (the 2020 title), 7th, 11th.

The end of the Kobe Bryant era was bad, which, due to age and other attrition, was understandable. But the LeBron era has been crowned by that asterisk-worthy title. By Laker standards, which means multiple titles, this period has been a failure, every bit as much as their Wilt Chamberlain era, where, in 5 seasons, they made 4 Finals but only won 1 title.

And, unlike Wilt, LeBron has been, effective, all of these things for the Lakers: Best all-around player, best scorer, best passer, head coach, general manager and chief scout. No one player, in any sport, has ever had that much power over a team. Perhaps none ever should again.

UPDATE: The Lakers again finished 7th in 2023 and 2024. The Bubble Season aside, they have not made the Finals since 2010. And the Celtics won an 18th title in 2024.

*

October 11, 2020 was a Sunday. The NHL had also decided its title later than usual, on September 28, with the Tampa Bay Lightning winning the Stanley Cup, beating the Dallas Stars in 6 games.

Baseball's postseason was also in progress, and "in a bubble." Or, rather, 2 bubbles: Petco Park in San Diego, a National League ballpark, for the American League Playoffs; and Globe Life Field in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas, an AL ballpark, for the NL Playoffs.

There was 1 game on this day, Game 1 of the AL Championship Series, at Petco. The Tampa Bay Rays beat the Houston Astros, 2-1. Blake Snell outpitched Framber Valdez. Randy Arozarena hit a home run. The Rays went on to win the series in 7 games, but lost the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

And these NFL games were played:

* The New York Giants lost to the Dallas Cowboys, 37-34 at AT&T Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.

* The New York Jets lost to the Arizona Cardinals, 30-10 at State Farm Stadium in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona.

* The Baltimore Ravens beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 27-3 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

* The Los Angeles Rams beat the Washington Football Team, 30-10 at FedEx Field (now Northwest Stadium) in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland. This game marked the return of Washington quarterback Alex Smith from an injury that nearly killed him 2 years earlier. I have a separate entry for this event.

* The Carolina Panthers beat the Atlanta Falcons, 23-16 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.

* The Houston Texans beat the Jacksonville Jaguars, 30-14 at NRG Stadium (as Reliant Stadium was then known) in Houston.

* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 38-29 at Heinz Field (now Acrisure Stadium) in Pittsburgh.

* The Cleveland Browns beat the Indianapolis Colts, 32-23 at FirstEnergy Stadium (now named Huntington Bank Field) in Cleveland.

* The Las Vegas Raiders beat the Kansas City Chiefs, 40-32 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Miami Dolphins beat the San Francisco 49ers, 43-17 at Levi's Stadium in the San Francisco suburb of Santa Clara, California.

* The Seattle Seahawks beat the Minnesota Vikings, 27-26 at Lumen Field in Seattle.

* The preceding Thursday, the Chicago Bears beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 20-19 at the new Soldier Field in Chicago.

* The next night, on ESPN Monday Night Football, the New Orleans Saints beat the Los Angeles Chargers, 30-27 at the Superdome in New Orleans.

* Pushed back to Tuesday night due to COVID reasons, the Tennessee Titans beat the Buffalo Bills, 42-16 at Nissan Stadium in Nashville.

* And the Denver Broncos, the Detroit Lions, the Green Bay Packers and the New England Patriots had a bye week.

June 1, 2020: Trump's Bible Photo-Op

Two things Trump had clearly never read,

and would never agree with:

That book, which said it's easier for a camel to go through

the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into Heaven;

and that sign, which says, "ALL ARE WELCOME."

June 1, 2020: Donald Trump poses for what he believes will be the photo opportunity that will get him re-elected President of the United States. As with 99 percent of all the things he has ever done, he turns out to be wrong.

Seven days earlier, on May 25, a black man named George Floyd died in Minneapolis. He was 46 years old. The cause was asphyxiation. He had been arrested by police officers on a charge of using counterfeit money. As a means of restraining him, Officer Derek Chauvin, a white man, had knelt on Floyd's neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds.

Three other officers kept onlookers back, preventing them from interfering on Floyd's behalf. His last words, echoing those of Eric Garner, a black New Yorker killed through police brutality in 2014, were, "I can't breathe." This was captured on video, and it "went viral," sparking outrage across the country.

The group Black Lives Matter (BLM) had started in 2013, in response to previous examples of police brutality. Floyd's murder led them to launch protest marches, despite the COVID epidemic being in full swing.

Among their protests was one in Washington, D.C., gathering on H Street, a block north of Pennsylvania Avenue, in front of the north gate of the White House on May 29. This infuriated Trump, who believes that black lives don't matter. He hid in the bunker underneath the White House, a facility designed to withstand a nuclear attack. Built on the orders of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II, only one other President has ever used it: George W. Bush, on September 11, 2001, which, at least briefly, was justified. John F. Kennedy did not use it during the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962.

The thousands of demonstrators wouldn't go away, staying throughout the weekend. They committed no acts of violence, but, down in his bunker, the Twitter-addicted Trump kept tweeting about how they were "destroying" the nation's capital, the way they had done to Minneapolis and to Portland, Oregon, examples which were also lies.

On the morning of Monday, June 1, Trump held a Cabinet meeting, and said the violence (which was not happening) made him look "weak." The one thing Trump hates more than nonwhite people is people who look weak.

He discussed invoking the Insurrection Act of 1807. It empowers the President to nationally deploy the U.S. military, and to federalize the National Guard units of the individual states, in specific circumstances, such as the suppression of civil disorder, of insurrection, and of armed rebellion against the federal government of the U.S. The Insurrection Act provides a statutory exception to the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, which limits the president's deploying the U.S. military to enforce either civil law or criminal law within the United States.

Invoking the Insurrection Act was favored by Vice President Mike Pence -- the events of the following January 6 making this a retroactive irony -- but opposed by Attorney General William Barr, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley. And it would have been Esper and Milley who would have to carry out any orders Trump gave under the Act.

Trump shouted, "None of you have any backbone to stand up to the violence!" and asked Milley why soldiers could not shoot protesters. "Can't you just shoot them? Just shoot them in the legs or something." It had been 50 years since the Ohio National Guard had shot 13 demonstrators, killing 4 of them, at a protest against the Vietnam War at Kent State University in Ohio. Now, Trump wanted a "Kent State" on a massive scale. (It had been 88 years since the U.S. Army shot at the "Bonus Army" on Capitol Hill. That time, 2 protestors died.)

At 5:05 PM, a convoy of 9 trucks carrying uniformed National Guard troops entered the White House complex. At 6:23, 6:26 and 6:28, Park Police made announcements directing protesters to leave. They did not. At 6:32, policemen with riot shields moved up into H Street and 16th Street. At 6:36, a SWAT team threw a "stingball" grenade, containing rubber pellets, into the crowd. At 6:39, a SWAT officer threw a smoke grenade into the crowd.

At 6:43, in the Rose Garden on the south side of the White House, the other side from the demonstration, Trump gave a speech. He spoke for 7 minutes, saying variations on his usual garbage, and concluded with "Thank you very much, and, now, I am going to pay my respects to a very, very special place."

At 7:01, he began walking with a group of White House officials, and a security detail from the White House complex, to St. John's Episcopal Church, at 1525 H Street. He got there at 7:06, and stood in front of the church, holding up a Bible -- upside-down, as if he had no clue as to how a Bible is to be held.

Trump thought the police action and the photo op would make him look like he was the only thing standing between black thugs, and the harm he was saying they were causing, and good white law-abiding Christian Americans. Instead, it made him look like a dumb and racist dictator.

"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full."

-- Jesus, quoted in Matthew 6:5

James Mattis, who had served as Secretary of Defense in the 1st 2 years of the Trump Administration, and had previously been a 4-star General in the U.S. Marine Corps, said this:

When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered, under any circumstance, to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens, much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside.

Four days later, on June 5, Mayor Muriel Bowser of Washington named a 2-block section of 16th Street "Black Lives Matter Plaza." She ordered "BLACK LIVES MATTER" to be painted in bright yellow letters on the black asphalt of the street, so that Trump would have to see it when he looked out that side of the White House, and when he went overhead in the Marine One helicopter.

The Presidential election was held 5 months later. Trump won the white vote, 58 percent to 41; but lost the black vote, 87-12; lost the Latino vote, 65-33; and lost the Asian vote, 63-36. He won Protestants, 60-39; but lost Catholics, 52-47, despite his opposition to abortion; lost Jews, 76-22; and lost people who professed no religion, 65-31. He lost gay people, 67-30; and straight people, 50-48.

Voting by age was interesting. People old enough to remember the police bashing antiwar demonstrators in the 1960s and 1970s, and old enough to need Social Security and Medicare, would seem to lean Democratic. But many people get more conservative as they get older, and prefer to see police beating up protestors.

So Trump won people age 65 and up, 52-47; and people 50-64 by the same margin. These were people for whom the defining Republican President was Ronald Reagan. He lost people 40-49, 54-44; 30-39, 51-46; and 25-29, 54-43. These were people for whom the defining Republican President was the failed George W. Bush. Trump lost people 18-24, for whom he was the defining Republican President, 65-31.

*

June 1, 2020 was a Monday. All professional sports were still on hold due to the pandemic. Therefore, there were no scores on this historic day.

March 27, 2020: Trump Approves Genocide -- of Americans

March 27, 2020: Donald Trump, having put Vice President Mike Pence in charge of America's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, says that he instructed Pence not to reach out to Governors who aren't "appreciative" of his Administration's efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus in their States.

He mentioned Gov. Jay Inslee of Washington and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, both Democrats who had been critical of the White House's actions to combat the deadly pandemic.

Trump said that Pence "calls all the Governors. And I tell him, I'm a different type of person, and I say, 'Mike, don't call the Governor of Washington. You're wasting your time with him.'"

It should be noted that Inslee had run to be one of Trump's 2020 opponents, but his Presidential campaign never made it out of 2019. Whitmer, however, did not run against Trump.

So, basically, Trump was operating like an old-time big-city "political machine" Mayor: Only picking up the garbage, plowing the streets, and fixing the potholes in the neighborhoods that voted for him. He was denying funding to Governors of Blue States.

States likely to have more minorities than Red States.

In other words, Trump was deciding who was going to get proper care, based on race.

In other words, Donald Trump was committing an act of genocide.

I doubt that any of the previous 44 Presidents -- or 43, since Grover Cleveland had nonconsecutive terms, and thus gets counted twice -- would have denied aid to Governors who "weren't nice to him."

Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover had thin views of a President's constitutional power. Lyndon Johnson had a similar need for ego-stroking. And Richard Nixon could be as petty as hell. But even they would have chosen to overcome those issues, and tried to save as many lives as they could. If they failed, so be it: At least they would have tried. They could be accused of trying the wrong thing, but not of an unwillingness to try something.

Trump? He did not do his best and see it fail. He made a conscious choice. He turned Franklin Roosevelt's reassuring words upside-down: "The only thing you have to fear is me!"

It was all a part of the method to his madness: Deny that the problem existed, because admitting it would make him look weak, something he was desperate to avoid at all times, but especially at this point, when he was running for re-election; then, help his own people, and only his own people, to lead to victory.

Either he was too dishonest to be President, or too incompetent to be President. Of course, it could be that he was both. But look at these statements, gathered by Representative Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat who has represented a District based on Austin, Texas since 1995:

January 22, 2020: "We have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China. It's going to be just fine."

February 2: "We pretty much shut it down coming in from China."

February 10: "Looks like, by April, you know, in theory, when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away."

February 25: "I think that's a problem that's going to go away… They have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we're very close to a vaccine." (The 1st vaccine available to the public was made so on December 11. That was 290 days later. That was not "very close.")

February 27: "It's going to disappear. One day, it's like a miracle, it will disappear."

March 4: "If we have thousands, or hundreds of thousands, of people that get better just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work -- some of them go to work, but they get better."

March 5: "I never said people that are feeling sick should go to work."

March 6: "You have to be calm. It'll go away."

March 10: "Just stay calm. It will go away."

March 12, "The Day Everything Stopped": "You know, you see what's going on. And so, I just wanted that to stop as it pertains to the United States. And that's what we've done. We've stopped it."

March 13: "No, I don't take responsibility at all."

March 14, asked to rate his response on a scale of zero to ten, apparently taking responsibility for this gross misperception: "I'd rate it a ten."

March 24: "I'm also hopeful to have Americans working again by that Easter, that beautiful Easter day." (Never mind that Easter is a Sunday and a holiday, and most Americans wouldn't have been working.)

March 24, talking about the Governors and Mayors who needed more hospital beds and more tests: "They have to treat us well, also. They can't say, 'Oh, gee, we should get this, we should get that.'"

March 26: "We've had a big problem with the young, a woman Governor from, you know who I'm talking about, from Michigan." (At the time, Whitmer was 48 years old.)

March 27: "I love Michigan, one of the reasons we are doing such a great job for them during this horrible pandemic. Yet your Governor, Gretchen 'Half' Whitmer, is way in over her head, she doesn't have a clue. Likes blaming everyone for her own ineptitude!"

March 27: "We're doing a great job for the State of Washington, and I think the Governor...he's constantly chirping and I guess complaining, would be a nice way of saying it."

March 30: "Stay calm, it will go away. You know it -- you know it is going away, and it will go away, and we're going to have a great victory."

March 30, keeping in mind that the State of New York also had a Democratic Governor, Andrew Cuomo: "I think New York should be fine, based on the numbers that we see, they should have more than enough. I mean, I'm hearing stories that they're not used, or they're not used right." (Whenever Trump says things like "I'm hearing," or "People are saying," that means he is making it up.)

April 1, about Governors who were pleading for medical gear and ventilators to treat surging coronavirus hospitalizations: "They have to treat us well, also. They can't say, 'Oh, gee, we should get this, we should get that.'"

April 6: The U.S. death toll passed 10,000, nearly all of those within the previous month.

April 9, when asked if his coronavirus response could have been better: "I couldn't have done it any better." That statement was almost certainly the truth: Almost any other President could have done it better, but he couldn't have. This is why Trump lies, about everything, about big things and small things alike: Because the truth hurts him.

April 11: The U.S. death toll passed 20,000. That's doubling the number of deaths in just 5 days.

Trump did one, and only one, smart thing in regard to COVID: He never let the media show the dead bodies. That was the lesson he learned from the Vietnam War: If people never see the bodies or the coffins on TV, they won't get angry, demonstrate in the streets, and demand a different President.

So, unless you knew someone who died from it, the death of 250,000 Americans before Election Day -- a quarter of a million -- wasn't real, only the annoying restrictions were. The Democrats were for the restrictions.

March 27, 2020 would have been my father's birthday. He had Bacehlor's and Master's of Science degrees from what's now known as the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark. On the one hand, he would have appreciated that, in March 2020, Americans were talking about science and not sports. On the other hand, he would have hated the reason why. "You ninny!" would have been the least of his utterances at Trump.

UPDATE: As of April 26, 2023, 1,130,662 Americans had died from COVID. The Brookings Institution estimated that 784,672 of those people -- about 69 percent -- died as a result of Trump's inaction.

Seven hundred eighty-four thousand, six hundred seventy-two people:

* That's 20 percent more Americans as died in the Civil War, North and South combined.

* Half again as many Americans as died in World War I and World War II combined.

* 13 times as many as died in the entire Vietnam War.

* 98 1900 Galveston Hurricanes.

* 174 Iraq Wars.

* 261 9/11s.

* 327 Pearl Harbors.

* 355 Johnstown Floods of 1889.

* 522 Titanics.

* 563 Hurricane Katrinas.

* 655 Lusitanias.

* 854 Jonestown Massacres.

* 1,595 Cocoanut Grove Fires of 1942.

* 2,615 Great Chicago Fires of 1871.

* 3,089 Hurricane Sandys.

* 4,671 Oklahoma City bombings.

* 5,374 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fires of 1911.

* 8,437 Malbone Street Wrecks of 1918.

* 30,183 Sandy Hook Massacres.

* And 196,190 Benghazis.

All because Trump not only refused to give the aid that was needed, where it was needed, but also refused to use the pandemic plan left for him by President Black Man.

The blood of 784,672 Americans is on Donald Trump's hands -- and that's only counting COVID, not including everything else he's done.

As of March 27, 2026, the CDC estimated that 1,231,440 Americans had died from the disease.

*

March 27, 2020 was a Friday. COVID had already forced everything to be shut down. There were no scores on this day.

March 11, 2020: The Sports World Is Shut Down

March 11, 2020: There were 4 NBA games played. The New York Knicks beat the Atlanta Hawks, 136-131 in overtime at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Detroit Pistons, 124-106 at the Wells Fargo Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia. The Charlotte Hornets beat the Miami Heat, 109-98 at the American Airlines Arena (now the Kaseya Center) in Miami. And the Dallas Mavericks beat the Denver Nuggets, 113-97 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.

There were 5 NHL games played. The New York Rangers lost to the Colorado Avalanche, 3-2 in overtime at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver. The Chicago Blackhawks beat the San Jose Sharks, 6-2 at the United Center in Chicago. The Winnipeg Jets beat the Edmonton Oilers, 4-2 at Rogers Place in Edmonton. The Los Angeles Kings beat the Ottawa Senators, 3-2 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles. And the St. Louis Blues beat the Anaheim Ducks, 4-2 at the Honda Center in Anaheim.

Two Major League Soccer teams played games in the CONCACAF Champions League, both against teams from Mexico. New York City FC, yet again forced out of Yankee Stadium for reasons beyond their control -- at this point, a team that doesn't control its own venue looks really stupid -- played at Red Bull Arena in Harrison, New Jersey, home of their arch-rivals, who were happy to take the money of the richest team in MLS, and lost 1-0 to Tigres UANL of San Nicolás de los Garza. And Atlanta United lost 3-0 to Club América, at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City.

And Major League Baseball was in Spring Training. The Yankees lost to the Miami Marlins, 3-1 at Roger Dean Stadium in Jupiter, Florida. The Mets beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 7-3 at Clover Park (the new name of their Spring Training stadium since 1988) in Port St. Lucie, Florida.

The next day, March 12, 2020, was The Day Everything Stopped. The Coronavirus pandemic, known as COVID-19, had shut everything down. That day, I wrote this on Facebook: "Now, it has really gotten real. Disney has chosen safety over money, and is closing both Disneyland in California and Disney World in Florida."

Disney chose safety over money. Donald Trump did not: He continued to call COVID a hoax, designed to hurt him in the election.

In the end, it didn't hurt him. His supporters came out to vote for him, anyway. The Democrats' get-out-the-vote effort, already in place before COVID, is what beat him: There were simply more of them than of the other side, and while COVID was one reason they came out, including in what turned out to be the key States, it was far from the only reason.

I had gotten my long-awaited 1st hip replacement on February 19, and was scheduled to start outpatient therapy when the shutdown came. On March 17, I wrote, "This is what my life has come to. I am still waiting for women to return my calls, but now, they are all doctors' receptionists."

And on April 5, I wrote, "I feel like I'm 14 again. The President is a 73-year-old greedy senile Republican the media covers for, current music mostly sucks, and the Yankees aren't winning the Pennant." Of course, at that point, we didn't know if the season would get started at all, and that anybody would win the Pennants. For the first time since the Strike of '94, we didn't know if baseball would get started again until the next season, or ever.

UPDATE: According to this source, over 1.1 million Americans died from COVID. We may never know how many would have lived had a vaccine been available sooner. It would take until June 2021 for the various vaccines to be available to all Americans. From then until this article, by Philip Bump, was published in The Washington Post on April 21, 2022, it had been estimated that 234,000 Americans had died from COVID after refusing to get vaccines.

February 7, 2021: Tampa Bay: City of Champions?

February 7, 2021: For the 1st time, an NFL team plays in the Super Bowl on its home field. This is never by design, even though the chance had nearly always been there:

* Up to this point, Miami had hosted 11 Super Bowls, and the Miami Dolphins had appeared in 5 -- but never in the same season.

* New Orleans hosted 10 times, but the New Orleans Saints never even reached the Playoffs until the season of Super Bowl XXII. They finally made it to Super Bowl XLIV, and won it -- in Miami.

* The Los Angeles Rams almost did it: They reached Super Bowl XIV, but that game was played at the Rose Bowl, not at their home field at the time, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Either Miami, New Orleans or the Los Angeles area hosted the 1st 7 Super Bowls, 14 of the 1st 15, and 19 of the 1st 24, but no home team played in one.

* The Dallas Cowboys played in 8 Super Bowls, winning 5, and one of the main reasons for building AT&T Stadium in suburban Arlington, Texas was the hope that they could host a Super Bowl,. and play in it. They were awarded Super Bowl XLV, but they finished 6-10 that season.

The 2020 season was unlike any other in NFL history, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Having to play the early part of the season behind closed doors proved what had long been suggested: Between television revenue and merchandising, an NFL team could make a profit even if paying attendance was exactly zero. By the time of Super Bowl LV at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida, restrictions had been lifted to the point where 24,835 fans were let in.

On March 20, 2020, in the first few days of the COVID shutdown, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who were set to be the host team for the Super Bowl, signed a free agent to play quarterback for them: Tom Brady, who had led the New England Patriots to win 6 Super Bowls -- by any means possible, legitimate or otherwise. Brady told them to sign his favorite receiver, for Pats tight end Rob Gronkowski, and they did. Despite having won Super Bowl XXXVII in 2003, the Bucs were still one of the NFL's joke franchises, but Brady and Gronk were ready to lift them out of that.

Under head coach Bruce Arians, they went 11-5 in the regular season. They had to play 3 Playoff games on the road in order to reach a home Super Bowl, and won them all: They beat the Washington Football Team (in their Redskins-to-Commanders interregnum), 31-23 in Landover, Maryland; beat the New Orleans Saints, 30-20 at the Superdome; and beat the Green Bay Packers, 31-26 at Lambeau Field.

Their opponents would be the Kansas City Chiefs, the defending World Champions, who had beaten the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LIV. Under head coach Andy Reid, and with quarterback Patrick Mahomes, they had the best record in the NFL, 14-2, losing only a home to the Las Vegas Raiders, and a meaningless regular-season finale, home to the Los Angeles Chargers. They had a bye in the Wild Card Round; beat the Cleveland Browns, 22-17 at home at Arrowhead Stadium in the Divisional Playoff; and beat the Buffalo Bills, 38-24 at Arrowhead in the AFC Championship Game.

Raymond James Stadium

As the defending Champions, the Chiefs were favored by 3 points. Sure enough, the Chiefs scored first, on a 49-yard field goal by Harrison Butker. But Brady marched the Bucs down the field, and threw an 8-yard touchdown pass to Gronk, to give them a 7-3 lead as the 1st quarter ran out.

In the 2nd quarter, Brady threw 2 more touchdown passes, for 17 yards to Gronk and 1 to Antonio Brown. In between, Butker kicked another field goal, but it was 21-6 Tampa Bay at the half, and the Chiefs never seriously threatened again.

The Pirate Ship, Raymond James Stadium

Butker and the Bucs' Ryan Succop each kicked a 52-yard field goal in the 3rd quarter. In between, Leonard Fournette scored on a 27-yard touchdown run. It was 31-6 Buccaneers at the end of the 3rd quarter. There was no scoring in the 4th. The Bucs had their 2nd Vince Lombardi Trophy.

Brady had his 7th -- his 1st without Bill Belichick as his head coach. Most people who had not yet been calling Brady the greatest quarterback ever -- ignoring his proven cheating -- pretty much joined the people who had been calling him that in now calling him the greatest player ever, regardless of position. Having previously honored him as such in 2005, Sports Illustrated named Brady their Sportsperson of the Year for 2021. The only other 2-time winners have been Tiger Woods and, with 3, LeBron James.

The Tampa Bay Lightning had won the Stanley Cup on September 28, 2020, those Playoffs delayed by the COVID pandemic. They repeated on July 7, 2021. Therefore, from February 7, 2021 to February 13, 2022, a little over 1 full year, 371 days, the Tampa Bay region held the World Championships of both football and hockey.

In addition, the Tampa Bay Rays had won the 2020 American League Pennant, and the Tampa Bay Rowdies won the 2021 United Soccer League title. People in the Tampa Bay region claimed a title that had been used by other cities in the past: "City of Champions." It didn't work: The USL is the 2nd tier of North American soccer, the Rays lost the World Series, and the Bucs' Super Bowl and the Bolts' Cups were won under unusual conditions.

After all, from May 16, 1980 to January 25, 1981, Philadelphia made it to the Finals of all of the "Big Four" sports, but won only one, the World Series. While, from October 28, 1981 to June 8, 1982, Los Angeles won the NBA Championship legitimately after winning the World Series in a strike-shortened season. Neither city's fans then claimed the "City of Champions" mantle. And when the Oakland Athletics won the 1989 World Series by beating the San Francisco Giants, in between back-to-back Super Bowl wins by the San Francisco 49ers, the San Francisco Bay Area as a whole didn't claim it. So Tampa Bay was on shaky ground claiming it.

The year after this Super Bowl, the Los Angeles Rams were both the host team and the NFC Champions, and won Super Bowl LVI, beating the Cincinnati Bengals at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.

UPDATE: The Buccaneers have a Ring of Honor. From their founding era, including their trip to the 1979 NFC Championship Game, they have honored quarterback Doug Williams, tight end Jimmie Giles, defensive end Lee Roy Selmon and head coach John McKay.

From their Super Bowl XXXVII winners, they have honored running back Mike Alstott, defensive tackle Warren Sapp, defensive end Simeon Rice, linebacker Derrick Brooks, cornerback Ronde Barber, safety John Lynch, head coach Jon Gruden, defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin, and owner Malcolm Glazer.

From between those eras, they have honored head coach Tony Dungy and offensive tackle Paul Gruber. From their Super Bowl LV winners, so far, they have honored only head coach Bruce Arians.

The Florida Sports Hall of Fame has inducted Selmon, Brooks, Dungy, Gruden, founding owner Hugh Culverhouse, 1990s running back Warrick Dunn, and the team's 1st starting quarterback, Steve Spurrier, although that's more for his playing and coaching at the University of Florida.

*

February 7, 2021, like all Super Bowl days, was a Sunday. Baseball was out of season. There were 5 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks lost to the Miami Heat, 109-103 at Madison Square Garden.

* The Charlotte Hornets beat the Washington Wizards, 119-97 at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte.

* The Utah Jazz beat the Indiana Pacers, 103-95 at the Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Boston Celtics, 100-91 at the Phoenix Suns Arena. (It was in between naming-rights contracts. It was soon renamed the Footprint Center, now the Mortgage Matchup Center.)

* And the Sacramento Kings beat the Los Angeles Clippers, 113-110 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles, which was also the home of an NHL team named the Kings.

And there were 5 games in the NHL:

* The Boston Bruins beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 2-1 at the Wells Fargo Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Detroit Red Wings, 3-1 at the Amalie Arena (now the Benchmark International Arena) in Tampa. This game faced off at 7:00 PM, and ended at 9:21, so it was played during the Super Bowl. I can find no reference as to attendance, COVID-affected or otherwise.

* The Florida Panthers beat the Nashville Predators, 2-1 at the BB&T Center (now the Amerant Bank Arena) in the Miami suburb of Sunrise, Florida.

* The Vegas Golden Knights beat the Los Angeles Kings, 5-2 at the T-Mobile Arena in the Las Vegas suburb of Paradise, Nevada.

* And the San Jose Sharks beat the Anaheim Ducks, 5-4 in a shootout at the Honda Center in Anaheim.

January 20, 2021: Joe Biden Is Inaugurated as President

January 20, 2021: Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. is inaugurated as the 46th President of United States, ending the 4-year tyranny of Donald Trump.

There really was some question as to whether Trump and his family would refuse to accept the Inauguration, and have to be escorted out of the White House by the Secret Service at 12:01 PM. They eliminated that possibility by getting out of Washington early. Trump became the 1st outgoing President since 1869, and only the 5th overall, to refuse to welcome his successor to the White House, ride with him to the ceremony, and then attend the President-elect's Inauguration.

The others:

* 1801: Despite their former, and eventually restored, friendship, John Adams left town before Thomas Jefferson could be sworn in.

* 1829: John Quincy Adams followed his father's example, and left town before Andrew Jackson could be sworn in.

* 1841: Martin Van Buren refused to welcome William Henry Harrison.

* 1869: Andrew Johnson refused to welcome Ulysses S. Grant.

This, of course, does not count Presidents who didn't attend their successors' swearing-in because they died in office: Harrison for John Tyler in 1841, Zachary Taylor for Millard Fillmore in 1850, Abraham Lincoln for Johnson in 1865, James Garfield for Chester Arthur in 1881, William McKinley for Theodore Roosevelt in 1901, Warren Harding for Calvin Coolidge in 1923, Franklin Roosevelt for Harry Truman in 1945, and John F. Kennedy for Lyndon Johnson in 1963.

Nor does it count Richard Nixon for Gerald Ford upon his resignation in 1974. Gerald and Betty Ford did escort Richard and Pat Nixon to the waiting helicopter before Gerald's swearing-in.

Outgoing Vice President Mike Pence did attend the ceremony. So did former Presidents Barack Obama (Democratic, to whom Biden had been Vice President), George W. Bush (Republican), and Bill Clinton (Democratic). The only former President still living who did not attend was Jimmy Carter (Democratic), who was 96 years old and, given the continued COVID situation and security concerns, thought it best to decline the invitation.

Those "security concerns" were about a possible 2nd attempt by Trump supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol Building, after the insurrection 2 weeks earlier delayed, but did not prevent, the certification of the Electoral Votes that confirmed Biden as President-elect.

Lady Gaga (Stefani Germanotta) sang the National Anthem. Her fellow New Yorker, Jennifer Lopez, sang Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" and "America the Beautiful." Garth Brooks sang "Amazing Grace." Amanda Gorman, just short of turning 23 years old and looking even younger, recited her poem "The Hill We Climb."

At 11:40 AM, outgoing Senator Kamala Harris of California was sworn in as Vice President, the 1st woman and the 1st nonwhite person to hold the post, by U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor. And at 11:48 -- 12 minutes before the official start of his term -- Biden was sworn into office by the Supreme Court's Chief Justice, John Roberts.

Biden's Inaugural Address lasted 21 minutes, about average. He pledged to "fight as hard for those who did not support me as for those who did."

At the end of the Inaugural Ceremonies, Biden, the 3 former Presidents in attendance, their wives, the new Vice President, and her husband, Douglas Emhoff, were driven across the Potomac River, to Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, to participate in a gesture of unity, a wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

*

January 20, 2021 was a Wednesday. Baseball was out of season. The NFL was in the middle of its Playoffs. There were 9 games played in the NBA:

* The Brooklyn Nets lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers, 147-135 in double overtime at the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse (now the Rocket Arena) in Cleveland. Kevin Durant scored 38 points for the Nets, and Kyrie Irving added 37. But Collin Sexton scored 42 for the Cavs, and Cedi Osman 25.

* The Philadelphia 76ers beat their arch-rivals, the Boston Celtics, 117-109 at the Wells Fargo Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia. Joel Embiid scored 42 points.

* The Atlanta Hawks beat the Detroit Pistons, 123-115 in overtime at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Trae Young scored 38 points.

* The Miami Heat beat the Toronto Raptors, 111-102 at the Amalie Arena in Tampa. The Raptors played all their 2020-21 season "home games" there because COVID restrictions prevented the league's only Canada-based team from entering Canada.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Houston Rockets, 109-103 at the Toyota Center in Houston.

* The Dallas Mavericks beat the Indiana Pacers, 124-112 at the Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

* The Orlando Magic beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, 97-96 at the Target Center in Minneapolis.

* The Los Angeles Clippers beat the Sacramento Kings, 115-96 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles. Kawhi Leonard scored 32.

* And the Golden State Warriors beat the San Antonio Spurs, 121-99 at the Chase Center in San Francisco.

There were 5 games played in the NHL:

* The Edmonton Oilers beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-1 at the Scotiabank Arena. Under the League's COVID restrictions, all 7 Canada-based teams were placed in the same Division, and all 31 teams played regular season games only within the Division assigned to them for this one season. Oddly, this was the easternmost game played in the NHL that day.

* The San Jose Sharks beat the St. Louis Blues, 2-1 in a shootout at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis.

* The Vegas Golden Knights beat the Arizona Coyotes, 5-2 at the T-Mobile Center in the Las Vegas suburb of Paradise, Nevada. Is this going to become a geographic rivalry? Maybe, but it depends on the Coyotes staying put. I suppose it could still be a rivalry, if the Coyotes move to Salt Lake City or San Diego.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Anaheim Ducks, 3-2 at the Honda Center in Anaheim.

* And the Vancouver Canucks beat the Montreal Canadiens, 6-5 at the Rogers Arena in Vancouver.