Goodbye 2018. It's time to start seriously thinking about Donald Trump's replacement.

On this last day of Trump Year 2, Senator Elizabeth Warren is in the news for formally announcing the formation of her presidential exploratory committee. She won't be the last challenger throwing her (or his) hat into the ring for the Democratic nomination. Earlier this week, the Times ran an article focusing on four U.S. Senators who are likely early candidates: Massachusetts' Warren, New Jersey's Cory Booker, California's Kamala Harris, and New York's Kirsten Gillibrand.

That led me to post this early Twitter poll:

POLL: Which one of these probable presidential candidates mentioned in the @NYTimes do you prefer at this very early point in the 2020 campaign?

— True Blue Liberal (@TrueBlueLiberal) December 29, 2018

With a new Democratic House of Representatives and the beginning of the 2020 presidential campaign, I hope 2019 gives all of us much more hopeful news about Democrats and much less news about you know who.

The Easiest Possible New Year's Resolution: WWDTD?

WWDTD is, of course, a simple mnemonic for "What Would Donald Trump Do?"

My resolution for 2018 is to remember to ask myself this question, and do the opposite. On the simplest level, asking myself WWDTD will keep me from golfing; praising myself inordinately; whining for an apology every time I feel my name, appearance, or intelligence has been slighted; hanging out in meetings with crowds of sycophants in suits and ties; looking for questionable ways to cheat on my taxes or otherwise gain money for myself and my family through schemes and shortcuts; creating a fraudulent 'university'; making a profit by raising the cost of admission to my annual New Year's Eve party at my own club; belittling people of a race, gender, or nationality that differs from mine; attacking people who express their patriotism differently or worship a different god, or no god; etc.; etc.

But those are all the obvious negatives inspired by the WWDTD resolution strategy. There are positive steps I can take too, by proactively doing the opposite of what DT would do. Last night, for example, rather than hanging out with billionaires in monkey suits and being bored to death at Mar-a-Lago to celebrate New Year's Eve, I watched (at extremely high volume) all four hours of the Grateful Dead's New Year's Eve show at Winterland as 1978 became 1979 while reading the latest issue of The New York Review of Books and drinking ginger tea with turmeric. That's not something DT would do.

I woke up this morning and went directly to a New Year's Day yoga class. That's not something DT would do.

I'm working on turning my vegetarian diet into a vegan diet. That's not something DT would do.

I want to read even more books, and read more widely, than I did in 2017. I stumbled on a couple of things this morning that are geared toward that goal, the Los Angeles Times' "How to read more books in 2018" and the New York Public Library's "Read Harder in 2018! NYPL's Suggestions for Book Riot’s Annual Challenge." Personally, I have found that signing up with Goodreads and taking their Reading Challenge for the past few years has kept me reading more than 40 books a year. That's not something DT would do (I doubt if he has read 40 books in his life).

WWDTD should provide guidance throughout the year. I'm going for a long walk now even though it's 12°F outside. That's not something DT would do.

Happy New Year (from Tennyson & Harrison)

In Memoriam [CVI. Ring out, wild bells]

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
   The flying cloud, the frosty light:
   The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
   Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
   The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind
   For those that here we see no more;
   Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
   And ancient forms of party strife;
   Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
   The faithless coldness of the times;
   Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
   The civic slander and the spite;
   Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
   Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
   Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
   The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
   Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

And George Harrison's 1974 variation on Tennyson's original:

Happy 2018 to all my fellow true blue liberalites.