Hump day open thread: It's a beautiful morning

Americans are rightly worried about the Russo-Ukraine War. For those of us long in the tooth, we remember living under a mushroom cloud. For those too young to remember the Cold War and mutually assured destruction, this is a new and frightening experience.

President Joe Biden took those fears to heart. He's lived through more global crises than we have. And, like the man who's been there, as a man whose job it is to keep us safe, he had this to say: "We're going to be OK."

No, it's not soaring rhetoric. He saved that for his excoriation of Russian aggression and his commitment to NATO and American leadership. That "we're going to be OK" was of a gentle man reassuring frightened people.

It was such a simple sentence. And yet it conveyed the essence of the man. Steady, unruffled, calming. Imagine if Donald Trump were still in office. Imagine the chaos we'd be in right now. It would be chaos he caused or encouraged. Instead, we have Grandpa Joe, the Kid From Scranton, the young boy with a stutter who grew up to lead the world through its darkest hour since the fall of Hitler's bunker. "We're going to be OK."

Sure, we're still worried. And sure, those words won't work on everyone. But for anyone who wanted to know that there was someone in charge who understood our fears, those words were as a soothing balm. 

And the main reason we're going to be OK is because Pres. Biden, unlike the former occupant of the West Wing, worked tirelessly to bring the world together against Vladimir Putin. He didn't bluster. He didn't preen for the cameras. He talked and cajoled and herded cats. He got the West in alignment, all in accord that Putin has to be stopped. The West has inflicted more economic damage on Russia than any sanctions in history have. 

I keep saying we're at an inflection point. Part of that is because of the war in which we're engaged. It's an experiment, to see if an aggressor can be stopped in his tracks not by being invaded, but by having his economy cut out from under him. Putin wants a neo-Russian empire. The problem is he doesn't have the economy that the Soviet Union did. California has an economy three times the size. And Pres. Biden used this to devastating effect. Russia is a second-rate power with oil and nuclear weapons. That's not enough to see you through if the world stands united against you.

I return to "we're going to be OK." I believe that we are. I know that we are. America's luck is in having the right people come along at the right time and move the country forward. This time it's Joe Biden's turn. 

Happy Wednesday, everyone. It's a beautiful morning.