Today is Friday, March 11, 2022. Today President Joe Biden declared that this country will suspend normal trade relations with Russia as part of the ongoing effort to punish President Vladimir Putin for his unprovoked war in Ukraine. I heard some of Biden’s forceful address from the White House Roosevelt Room sometime this morning. This new punishing move taken against the aggressor was covered in an online article for the Los Angeles Times written by Eli Stokols and Don Lee entitled “Biden, Europe suspend Russia’s trade status, ratcheting up economic pain for Putin.”

Taking a forceful tone, Biden asserted, “Putin is the aggressor and he must pay the price.” Biden noted that sanctions already imposed by the West are “crushing” Russia’s economy and warned that Moscow would pay “a severe price” if it deploys chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, as the White House suggested this week it may be plotting to do. This is another potential horror that could be directed toward the people of Ukraine if Putin decides to unleash this kind of attack against Ukraine. It would be truly unspeakable.

This latest move paves the way for the administration to increase tariffs on Russian imports above the levels pledged to all World Trade Organization members, in concert with the Group of 7 and European Union. Biden went on to say that this new sanction would “make it harder for Russia to do business with the United States.”

The President fully threw his support behind a bipartisan proposal that has gained steam in Congress in recent days that would revoke Russia’s Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status and direct the U.S. Trade Representative’s office to seek Russia’s ouster from the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Even though this move might sound punitive at first glance, experts predict that the actual effect against Russia will be more symbolic since the United States is not a major destination for Russian goods, which accounts for only about 1 percent of total imports. Thus the new potential tariffs on Russian products are unlikely to have a major impact on American consumers, who are already wigged out by inflation spiking to a 40-year high. Biden’s announcement arrives in coordination with European allies that trade more heavily with Russia, which will then further isolate the country from the global trading system.

Another consequence of revoking PNTR for Russia is the growing chorus of congressional voices asking to execute the same with other countries such as China in the future, and then, as conflicts arise, to enact it again against other countries. Gary Hufbauer, a trade expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said, “Once PNTR is revoked, it will take a new act of Congress to restore PNTR. This will put a burden on future presidents, since side issues will likely be attached to restoration, even when U.S. relations with the partner country are harmonious.”

The situation in Eastern Europe has eclipsed the news on COVID-19 here, as news shows seemingly broadcast 24-hour coverage on the war in Ukraine. This has been going on for at least two weeks. However, I’d like to report on a story that appeared online for 7 Los Angeles entitled “Never had COVID? As mask restrictions slowly disappear, what are the chances of getting it now?”

As many of you should know, virus restrictions fell by the wayside here in New York, where businesses are not mandated to ask for proof of vaccination anymore as of Monday, March 6. This doesn’t mean that some enterprises might still require proof of vaccination anyway. The article posits that it might be inevitable that everyone will get infected at some point.

One of those interviewed for the article, Maya Shabtai, a college student, said she came down with the virus in December. This fact is fascinating: that Shabtai is “one of the 43 percent of Americans that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates contracted the virus. That leaves 57 percent of people who’ve never had it.” So which group do you fall into?

Voicing a position that most of us would probably adhere to, Adam Leisure of Los Angeles said that he will still wear a mask when he’s around a group of people. He comments that he still gets anxious when he’s around many people. Now that mask restrictions are easing, Leisure wonders what the chances are of him contracting coronavirus now.

That risk is highly dependent on the amount of COVID that’s around you, so says Dr. Michael Ben-Aderet, Associate Medical Director of Hospital Epidemiology at Cedars-Sinai. The odds, though, of encountering someone with COVID-19 in L.A. County is pretty low, as it’s low now in New York City, where the daily test positivity rate here was under 1.4 percent. This is the lowest it’s been since July 20, according to Governor Kathy Hochul’s office.

Ben-Aderet indicates that masking is still really a good idea for people to maintain, especially when people around you might have COVID-19 and they stay masked while you do too. Then your risk of getting exposed to COVID is significantly less.

Another Los Angeles resident, John Wheeler, confessed to not liking to wear a face mask anymore. He indicated that he was at a point where he had three vaccinations.

So the upshot of the article is that we can lower our guard a bit as long as we keep an eye on transmission levels in our communities. As for my routine, I rarely wear a mask outside, but I still prefer to wear one inside venues like supermarkets and restaurants. I’ve taken off my mask in movie theaters where there is only a smattering of patrons sitting in the audience. I know people who have still not ventured into a restaurant for at least two years, and now that restrictions have lifted, I doubt that they will feel comfortable entering these establishments at this moment. There could be infected individuals sitting right next to me, they might be thinking. Elliot and I have always been comfortable with entering restaurants even before this new policy went into effect. I recall that restaurants on the Island have always been more lenient all throughout the pandemic. I’m sure Broadway theaters will still enforce a mask mandate into the near future. I’m of the opinion that COVID is still not completely vanquished; we still need to be vigilant going forward.

It’s getting late here.

I can write that Elliot and I had a very pleasant day after going to Home Depot on Metropolitan Avenue to return the old faucet and getting a new one, using “Cameron’s” specifications. When we entered the cavernous store, we just got all anxious over seeing so much hardware. We couldn’t find another faucet that would meet our contractor’s specifications, so instead of buying one which would need to be returned as well, we just called Cameron and indicated this. He said not to worry – he would go to a Home Depot in Brooklyn where he lives and purchase a new one for the kitchen and bring it with him on Monday.

When we returned to the apartment, we put the money we got from returning the old faucet on the computer desk and went out again. This time we took a nice drive to Beacon, New York, because of the beautiful weather – the calm before the storm, as they say. Some crazy winter storm is expected to hit the Northeast tomorrow. Winter is not over with us yet!

We stopped in Larchmont where we had breakfast at the Harbour House Coffee Shop, our go-to destination on our way up north. We then located Andersons Larchmont, a bookstore on Chatsworth Avenue. At first we had to ask a friendly pedestrian to point us in the right direction.

Our real goal was to visit the Binnacle Bookstore in Beacon, where I’ve frequented the small but well-stocked bookstore a number of times on our way up to Highland, New York, to visit “Ted” and “Peter.” The store is located on Main Street and is next door to a wonderful donut shop called Glazed Over Donuts. This was another of our destinations we intended to visit.

The drive up to Beacon was scenic and uneventful, thank god. We parked the car right on Main Street and began our walk to both sites. We located the donut shop first and entered and filled out a form indicating what kind of donuts we preferred. You see, the donuts are made as you wait. You can choose the glaze, the topping, and the kind of drizzle you want on your custom-prepared donut. You could also choose the particular donut of the day, which I did, since it was banana. You could also select a “naked donut,” meaning there is nothing on it. My eyes “glazed” (pun intended) over the form when I first took it to make my selections. I think I ordered four donuts. I had one there, the banana, with coffee. My overall selections were very modest, I believe, whereas Elliot’s were a little more elaborate.

We then walked to Binnacle Books, where Elliot surprised me by buying me a new book on comics written by Jeremy Dauber called American Comics: A History. I had seen this book in the little bookstore on Lefferts Boulevard, in Kew Gardens, a week or so ago. This tome is supposed to be my Father’s Day gift. A little early, don’t you think? I didn’t protest, though.

Before we walked into the bookstore, Elliot directed my attention to a cat cafe and adoption center right near the bookstore called Beans Cat Cafe. We looked through the window where we saw several cats playing alone or climbing on cat towers. I went inside and asked the owners, I guess, about going inside to play with the cats. I was told the price for a half hour was $7. Also, some of the cats or kittens were available for adoption. There were small tables outside where one could have coffee or tea and have a snack while peering at the cats inside. I wonder if there are similar cafes for cats in the city. I should do some research on this and get back to you at another time.

I couldn’t resist getting one book, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Basil and Josephine Stories and telling the proprietor that I enjoyed her bookstore.

Now it was time to drive to Arthur Avenue in the Bronx and to have dinner at Enzo’s in the Italian section. A delectable end to a very pleasant day.

Let’s hope tomorrow will not be so nasty. We can only hope.

Have a good weekend anyway.

Stay safe and be well.