This is the Stateline solar power plant, which is located right near the state line between California and Nevada on Interstate 15. As you can guess, it’s visible for many miles around.

Here’s the officially reported coronavirus death toll through December 29. The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here.

My Twitter feed has been full of arguments today about police shootings of suspects. I’m not sure why, but it’s as good a reason as any to go ahead and show how it’s changed over the past few years. Short answer: according to the Washington Post’s Fatal Force database, it hasn’t:

It’s true that police shootings of unarmed suspects have declined considerably in the years since Ferguson. And that’s good! However, the overall number of shootings has been flat, and the huge overrepresentation of Black suspects killed has been flat too. That’s a lot less good.

Usually I use a long telephoto lens when I’m shooting pictures at a zoo. The obvious reason for this is to get a nice, tight shot of the subject, but it’s also to blur out the fencing that encloses the animals. Sometimes, though, that’s just not in the cards, as in this picture of a baby lemur hanging on the fence and practically begging to come out and play. So adorable.

As you all know, vaccine distribution is going poorly. The feds don’t seem to care much about it and states are too broke to do the job right. That said, I predict here and now that this problem will soon be fixed and we will end up innoculating people at the same rate as Europe. This is much like the horrific computer botch that consumed Obamacare during its first month, which many, many people suggested might kill the program in its cradle. It didn’t, and first-year signups were fine. Likewise, this problem will probably get sorted out in the next few weeks and people will soon forget that it ever happened.

I don’t have any special reason for posting this except that Congress is getting ready to vote on an override of Donald Trump’s veto of the annual defense spending bill. So here is defense spending over the past 50 years:

It goes up and down during wars and peacetime, but ever since we came down from the Vietnam peak it’s remarkable how steady it’s been. The American populace seems willing to spend about $2000 each for defense, and that changes only modestly and temporarily over time.

The New York Times reports that Obamacare has worked pretty well during the pandemic:

State Medicaid enrollment, according to one report, had an 11 percent increase between February and September in the 36 states that have released data…Sign-ups for plans in marketplaces run by the federal government are up 6.6 percent compared with last year, according to a new federal tally. It is the only year during the Trump administration when enrollment increased, and amounts to a half-million more people seeking coverage from the federal marketplace.

The Commonwealth Fund has surveyed the health coverage scene recently and reports that being uninsured is up only slightly in 2020:

All things considered, that’s not bad considering the severity of the downturn. Someday, perhaps, Americans will finally come around to the idea that anything above zero is unacceptable.

Here’s the officially reported coronavirus death toll through December 28. The raw data from Johns Hopkins is here.

It’s almost the end of the year, which means there’s time for one more slot canyon picture. This one shows all the interesting colors, ranging from a bluish tint in the shadows all the way to bright yellow at the top where the sun is brightest. My mother is now eager to see one of the slot canyons, but that’s going to have to wait until everything opens up again. Maybe in the fall?

Chris Kleponis - Pool Via Cnp/CNP via ZUMA

I want to share a few recent headlines with you:

• Pushback on Xi’s Vision for China Spreads Beyond U.S.
• The broad coalition uniting to try to take down Viktor Orbán
• Boris Johnson’s Post-Brexit Plan for Britain Remains a Puzzle
  U.K. prime minister’s policies so far don’t suggest he wants to embark on a Margaret Thatcher-style economic revolution
• Breaking down President Trump’s final 23 days in office, upcoming Biden administration

Fears of military coups to the contrary, Donald Trump is gone. Hungary’s Viktor Orbán is facing a united opposition for the first time. More and more countries are getting fed up with Xi Jinping’s autocratic nationalism. Boris Johnson’s worst impulses seem to have been neutered.

For the last year or three, it’s been common to bemoan the decline of Western democracy. Exhibits A-F were the various nationalist populists who had taken power in countries around the world. But it doesn’t look nearly as bad these days, does it? It’s true that the news isn’t all good: Jair Bolsonaro is still screeching around in Brazil and Poland is still controlled by the deeply illiberal Law and Justice party. But the news is never all good. Generally speaking, liberal democracy sure seems a whole lot more resilient than it did a few years ago.