No Ordinary Moment in History

The historian Doris Kearns Goodwin titled her book about Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt during the World War II “No Ordinary Time.” It sure wasn’t. There’s nothing as dramatic as many of the events of Word War II occurring at present, so it’s tempting to think we are living in ordinary times, even though we are living at a singularly momentous time: The fate of the nation is at stake. In a Washington Post column yesterday Jennifer Rubin reported that a group of 150 scholars have sent an extraordinary letter to members of Congress, in which they state: “This is no ordinary moment in the course of our democracy. It is a moment of great peril and risk.” The letter lays out with clarity and precision the consequences that will result if the senate doesn’t suspend the filibuster rule and pass voting rights protection and electoral process reform well before the 2022 elections. The likely alternative is one of unprecedented horror.