Labor Day 2020

It’s late afternoon here in my corner of Florida; right now the weather outside is typical of the wet season – hot, muggy, and, after a passing thunderstorm, partly sunny. The temperature is 89˚F (32˚C), but with humidity at 64% and an easterly breeze blowing at 6 MPH, the feels-like temperature is 99˚F (37˚C). For a while there I thought the rest of the afternoon would be a total washout due to thunderstorm activity in the area, but thankfully the line of storms that passed through has moved away and it doesn’t look like the rest of Labor Day will be as wet or punctuated with the K-r-r-a-a-c-k Booms of lightning strikes nearby.

We didn’t do anything special here today in observance of Labor Day. The global COVID-19 pandemic has put the kibosh on many festive activities, so we made no plans to go to the beach, have a picnic, or even host a barbecue. Everyone here does pretty much his or her own thing anyway, especially now that we have two college-age youngsters who have their own social lives and other interests.  To be honest, I don’t think we did anything for Labor Day last year, but at least then there wasn’t a coronavirus pandemic to worry about.

Earlier today I wrote a review of my latest Star Wars The Black Series action figure acquisition – the six-inch scale Imperial Snowtrooper (Hoth) in cardback packaging designed to resemble the 1980 Kenner Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back Imperial Stormtrooper (Hoth Battle Gear) carded bubble-pack. I received my figure from Amazon yesterday, so I spent most of my morning evaluating the figure (in its original packaging) and doing research about snowtroopers, the original Kenner figure, its Star Wars The Black Series history, and downloading images from Hasbro. (I can’t take good pictures cos my hands tend to shake a bit.)

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Stormy weather moved into our neighborhood around 1 or so in the afternoon, so after a late brunch I decided to read out in the living room for a while. I began browsing through Peter Caddick-Adams’ Snow & Steel: The Battle of the Bulge, 1944-1945. I’m not quite ready to deep-dive into it since I am also reading Caddick-Adams’ Sand & Steel: The D-Day Invasion and the Liberation of France, as well as Ian W. Toll’s Twilight of the Gods: The War in the Western Pacific, 1944-1945. I want to finish those books before tackling Snow & Steel, but I did want to see how the book starts and if it will be profoundly different from other books about the same battle. It looks promising; so much so that I read the entire introduction and part of the first chapter.

Unfortunately, since I am not used to sitting on the couch for long periods of time and the lighting in that room is not reader-friendly, I got tired after an hour or so of reading, so after making sure the storms had moved out of the area, I logged back on to my computer, et voila! I’m here with a rare second WordPress blog post.

As Labor Day 2020 begins to wind down – it is late Monday afternoon where I am – and we all get into “regular work week” mindset, I fervently hope that this is the last one that takes place during a Trump Presidency. I’m still angry about his “just-for-show” patriotism and his pretense at caring about America’s military forces and veterans. I happen to believe The Atlantic’s revelation that he calls military personnel – especially those that have given their lives in battle – as “suckers” and “losers.”

I know that Trump’s “base” – the closest to a Stalin-like cult of personality that I have seen in American politics – is in denial, but the comments attributed to the 45^th President are not out of character for Donald Trump. Not in the slightest. After all, no one in the Trump family has served in the military since his grandfather fled from Germany to the U.S. to avoid obligatory military service there in the late 19^th Century. His father, Fred Trump, Sr. didn’t serve during World War II, and the President famously got several deferments from the draft during the Vietnam War. Some were granted because he was in college, but after becoming eligible once he earned his degree, his father bought off a doctor who certified Trump as being unfit for military duty due to “bone spurs” in his feet.

I mean, just look at this statement from a Trump supporter on a social media post by The Hill related to Trump’s pushback on the Atlantic article:

[O]nly the most nieve [sic], and hate mongers would think he did.

Trump has used his own private plane to bring home US Soldiers. He has used that same plane to bring families to their wounded loved ones. He has stepped into his limousine and asked the driver to take him to Arlington just to pay his respect. He has also been at Dover Airbase when our military dead have been brought home. This man has more respect for our Military than possibility any other President in history. Use your brain start thinking, lose the hate!

Hopefully next Labor Day, we won’t have Donald Trump occupying the Oval Office anymore.