In Mumbai, on New Year\u2019s Eve, they burn an effigy of the Old Man, the old year.<\/p>\n
I hope revelers in the port city gave him an extra hot send-off for me the other night, because good riddance to 2025.<\/p>\n
It was so bad that the best thing we can say at this point about 2026 is that it couldn\u2019t possibly be any worse than\u00a0 last year.<\/p>\n
Could it?<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a weird gargoyle-like goblin, actually perhaps more of a devil, down in the corner of my thoughts, taunting: \u201cWanna bet?\u201d<\/p>\n
I do not.<\/p>\n
But when a new year begins with my hometown of Altadena burning down in a firestorm, closely followed by the gross inauguration of Donald Trump and his kakistocracy \u2014 government by the worst among us \u2014 as president, matters could not get much worse, quite close to home and then for the entire world.<\/p>\n
His purely idiotic speech in the Capitol rotunda, surrounded by the kowtowing billionaires of Silicon Valley, caused former President Barack Obama, attending the inauguration without his sensible wife, to lean across former first lady Laura Bush and say to former President George W. Bush, \u201cHow do we stop this from happening?\u201d Proper smirks all around. Remember when W. once seemed the worst president ever? \u201cStop making me long for Bush!\u201d was the comment by one poster on a Reddit string about the proper smirks (Laura\u2019s, too).<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was no mention of allies, global institutions, Ukraine or even the existence of climate change; America\u2019s enemies were cast as Mexican cartels and Panama,\u201d former Obama speechwriter Ben Rhodes commented right after the speech. \u201cAn almost apocalyptic portrayal of a corrupt and declining America.\u201d<\/p>\n
And here we are 11 months later, with Trump unilaterally waging war against not Panama (so far, hasn\u2019t invaded its canal) or Mexico (so far, hasn\u2019t bombed it) but launching CIA-led ground attacks against Venezuela, with no plans to discuss his war with an acquiescent Congress.<\/p>\n
Good times, as the barstool cynics note. So it really can\u2019t get much worse, right?<\/p>\n
The gargoyles were cackling with delight as I wrote this during last week\u2019s New Year\u2019s Eve downpour, having just driven past a long convoy of U.S. Border and Customs Protection trucks in Pasadena\u2019s Arroyo Seco \u2014 some of them very large trucks, with no windows \u2014 leaving, for some reason, the area of Rose Parade float-building tents just south of the Rose Bowl.<\/p>\n
Were they conducting an immigration raid on the folks gluing last-minute flowers?<\/p>\n
Saving grace was the Dodgers: pure joy. My happiest times on the town last year were in Chavez Ravine, the most L.A. place ever. Watching every inning of the seven-game World Series was the most thrilling Southern California sports fan experience since the Lakers\u2019 Showtime. Among the several other geniuses of our diamond, Mookie Betts just makes me glad to be alive.<\/p>\n
But, OK, little devils, here\u2019s why 2026 can\u2019t get any worse than 2025 was. Brian Wilson, bless his love and mercy, died in 2025.<\/p>\n
So did Sam Moore, who sang the high notes on \u201cSoul Man\u201d and \u201cHold On, I\u2019m Coming\u201d by Sam and Dave. As did Steve Cropper, who hit the high notes on his guitar on those great records.<\/p>\n
So did Garth Hudson, soaring keyboardist and last surviving member of The Band.<\/p>\n
So did Marianne Faithful, from \u201cAs Tears Go By\u201d to \u201cBroken English,\u201d a smoky voice that accompanied my entire radio-listening life for over 60 years.<\/p>\n
So did Roberta Flack, whose \u201cKilling Me Softly\u201d and \u201cThe First Time Ever I Saw Your Face\u201d in the early \u201870s are the only time a solo artist won the Grammy for record of the year two years running.<\/p>\n
So did David Johansen, and if you have heard of but never listened to his New York Dolls and his Dexter Pointdexter characterization, stop right now and find them. \u201cWe thought that\u2019s the way you were supposed to be if you were in a rock and roll band. Flamboyant,\u201d he wrote. Correct.<\/p>\n
To top it off in the worst possible way, Sly Stone died in 2025. It\u2019s impossible to exaggerate how much his Family Stone, an East Bay congregation of Black Californians, White Californians, women \u2014 not just singing background, but playing horns \u2014\u00a0 and men, meant in the music world, and to us kids, listening. Oakland\u2019s Black Panthers tried to get Sly to kick the honkies out of the band. No dice, said Sly: \u201cThank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin).\u201d<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s hoping against hope \u201826 can make some of that kind of joy.<\/p>\n
Larry Wilson is on the Southern California News Group editorial board. lwilson@scng.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In Mumbai, on New Year\u2019s Eve, they burn an effigy of the Old Man, the old year. I…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":119550,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132,975,2082],"class_list":["post-119549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news","tag-opinion","tag-opinion-columnists"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119549"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119549\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/119550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}