The reign of Donald Trump has brought us face to face with the uniquely American brand of demagogy, from the dictatorial Huey Long and racist George Wallace to the Red-baiting Joe McCarthy and our current bully in chief, Donald Trump. But last month’s election reminds us that every one of those autocrats was toppled.
And while it took an assassin to ultimately bring down Long, a would-be assassin to derail Wallace, and McCarthy’s fellow senators to defang him (McCarthy died disgraced but still in office), this time it was voters — a majority of American voters — who said they didn’t want any more of this. Which is the way it should be.
Yes, the last six weeks have been knuckle- as well as nail-biting. And yes, it would have been heartening for progressives like me to have experienced the predicted blue wave. But Georgia could still deliver a Democratic Senate, and what matters is that we’re about to inaugurate a president who believes in healing our body politic along with our virus.
The abiding lesson is that our Republic is more resilient than we’d feared.
Larry Tye Cotuit, Mass. The writer is the author of “Demagogue: The Life and Long Shadow of Senator Joe McCarthy.”
Flexibility for Working Women
To the Editor:
Re “Google Pushes Back Return to Office Until September” (Business, Dec. 15):
A fringe benefit of flexibility for all workers means more flexibility for those who have historically needed it the most: working parents. The ability to work remotely part of the time or to find alternative hours to be in the office used to be an accommodation afforded primarily to mothers, begrudgingly and at a high cost both in terms of wages and professional advancement.
Flexibility for parents of all genders could also afford some couples the opportunity to better balance parenting responsibilities between mothers and fathers, easing the burden of the double shift on women.
In a year where hundreds of thousands of women have been pushed out of the work force, the cultural shift in how, when and where we work offers some good news. With more companies exploring and adopting hybrid work arrangements, I’m hopeful that one lasting legacy of the pandemic will be greater retention and promotion for the next generation of women in workplaces where flexibility is the norm.
Ilana Ettinger New York The writer is a lawyer and a mother.
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Home » Analysis & Comment » Opinion | The Lesson of the Last Four Years
Opinion | The Lesson of the Last Four Years
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To the Editor:
The reign of Donald Trump has brought us face to face with the uniquely American brand of demagogy, from the dictatorial Huey Long and racist George Wallace to the Red-baiting Joe McCarthy and our current bully in chief, Donald Trump. But last month’s election reminds us that every one of those autocrats was toppled.
And while it took an assassin to ultimately bring down Long, a would-be assassin to derail Wallace, and McCarthy’s fellow senators to defang him (McCarthy died disgraced but still in office), this time it was voters — a majority of American voters — who said they didn’t want any more of this. Which is the way it should be.
Yes, the last six weeks have been knuckle- as well as nail-biting. And yes, it would have been heartening for progressives like me to have experienced the predicted blue wave. But Georgia could still deliver a Democratic Senate, and what matters is that we’re about to inaugurate a president who believes in healing our body politic along with our virus.
The abiding lesson is that our Republic is more resilient than we’d feared.
Larry Tye
Cotuit, Mass.
The writer is the author of “Demagogue: The Life and Long Shadow of Senator Joe McCarthy.”
Flexibility for Working Women
To the Editor:
Re “Google Pushes Back Return to Office Until September” (Business, Dec. 15):
A fringe benefit of flexibility for all workers means more flexibility for those who have historically needed it the most: working parents. The ability to work remotely part of the time or to find alternative hours to be in the office used to be an accommodation afforded primarily to mothers, begrudgingly and at a high cost both in terms of wages and professional advancement.
Flexibility for parents of all genders could also afford some couples the opportunity to better balance parenting responsibilities between mothers and fathers, easing the burden of the double shift on women.
In a year where hundreds of thousands of women have been pushed out of the work force, the cultural shift in how, when and where we work offers some good news. With more companies exploring and adopting hybrid work arrangements, I’m hopeful that one lasting legacy of the pandemic will be greater retention and promotion for the next generation of women in workplaces where flexibility is the norm.
Ilana Ettinger
New York
The writer is a lawyer and a mother.
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