马萨诸塞州楠塔基特（美国有线电视新闻网）总统乔拜登和第一夫人吉尔拜登本周来到楠塔基特岛，希望保持这个国家在这个假期里非常期待的正常感。
总统和第一夫人带着一群孩子、孙子和他们的重要人物来到他们的感恩节假期——以及特勤局的机构、一小群工作人员和一群与总统一起旅行的记者——希望发出信号向该国其他地区表示，是时候回归 2020 年跳过的传统了。
他们经历了感恩节的例行公事：周四与家人共进盛宴，周五步行穿过楠塔基特岛，在当地一家餐馆用餐，在他们去过几十年的商店购物，然后参加镇上的圣诞树点灯活动。总统周五发推文支持小企业和餐馆，兑现了他在下午散步时小店购物的承诺。
但正如过去一年半经常发生的那样，大流行对总统来说永远不会遥远，因为他和其他美国人一样，对一种令人担忧的冠状病毒在国外传播的变种感到新的担忧。
当拜登夫妇在感恩节传统中微笑时，Covid-19 不可预测的严酷现实打断了黑色星期五的庆祝活动。在南非发现的该病毒的新 Omicron 变种 B.1.1.529 的报道引起了科学家和拜登政府的新担忧。南非官员周五向世界卫生组织通报时，随着英国、德国和日本等国异常迅速地采取行动，为南非和该地区其他国家制定了新的旅行禁令，新一波的海外旅行限制正在实施。
受此消息影响，美国和海外股市周五大幅下跌，道琼斯工业平均指数录得 2020 年 10 月以来最糟糕的一天，因为投资者对病毒轨迹的新不确定性做出了反应。周五下午，总统宣布了对南非和其他七个非洲国家的新旅行限制——他说此举是为了对新的“大问题”保持“谨慎”。
股价下滑、有关新变种病例出现在世界各地的其他国家的报道以及对受影响国家的旅行限制都带回了大流行初期的回声，而不是政府在过去几周中试图预测的乐观看法。来自南部非洲的消息使拜登每年一次前往楠塔基特的徒步旅行从一个更好的日子的信号转变为一个信息，即该国的新常态可以被保留——至少现在是这样。
拜登和他的团队认为，有效应对疫情是改善经济和总统恢复政治财富的唯一途径。现在关于政府将如何处理新变种及其经济破坏的问题正在流传，因为安东尼·福奇博士等联邦卫生官员警告说，关于它如何传播以及疫苗如何对抗它，还有很多东西需要了解。
大流行对经济的持续影响——在这个假期周还远未结束——在华尔街和拜登夫妇吃面包的海滨小镇都很明显。
与楠塔基特当地企业主和工人的对话突显了夏季居民与许多全年居住在这里的岛民之间日益扩大的经济差距。大流行以及由此产生的通货膨胀、供应链问题、劳动力短缺和经济适用房的缺乏加剧了这种差距。
位于该镇主要街道的 Murray's Beverage Store 的经理 Richard Vargas 告诉美国有线电视新闻网，劳动力短缺意味着他看到企业面临着“无法在这里招到足够的人来工作，人们想要上班，并获得能够为岛上的每个人提供服务的物资。”
“这里有很多勤劳的人，”他说——他解释说，其中许多人至少做两份工作来支付不断上涨的住房租金和购买食物。
在联邦快递担任第二份工作的巴尔加斯说，季节性来美国工作的人缺乏 J-1 签证，这也使得招聘工人变得困难。
“我们知道今年有很多人想回来，但因为无法获得签证而无法回来。这简直太疯狂了——比如，这里的所有商店，这里的任何企业，他们说同样的话：他们得不到足够的帮助，”巴尔加斯说。
拜登住在亿万富翁慈善家大卫·鲁宾斯坦 (David Rubenstein) 的家中，这是一个庞大的海滨大院。但在一个经常被描述为“精英”、“托尼”或“豪华”的岛屿上，那些维持这个地方运转的人——园丁、服务员、厨师、酒店管家，敏锐地感受到了影响国家的经济问题。店员。
根据楠塔基特岛食品、燃料、租赁援助机构的数据，尽管非常富有的人持续繁荣，但“生活在中等收入水平或以下的全年人口不断增长”和“全年经济适用房严重短缺”程序。
根据该镇的楠塔基特小屋医院的说法，粮食不安全状况正在加剧，大波士顿食品银行将楠塔基特县确定为马萨诸塞州四个“预计粮食不安全率在过去一年中增加了 70.0% 以上”的县之一。
劳动力短缺延伸到教师、警察和急救人员，《楠塔基特海峡》(Nantucket Current) 在 8 月报道称，楠塔基特公共工程部的员工外流“削弱”了其劳动力。
周三晚上，在楠塔基特商会的“营业时间”欢乐时光中，当地企业主对岛上贫富差距的担忧表示赞同，一位与会者描述了富人和特权阶层的“不同的楠塔基特经济”。那些支持他们生活方式的人。
众所周知，总统假期在历史上并不反映普通美国人的经历，从唐纳德特朗普总统经常在佛罗里达州棕榈滩的海湖庄园逃亡到巴拉克奥巴马总统在附近玛莎葡萄园岛的暑假。他们经常意识到选择托尼地点的政治危险——1995 年，比尔克林顿总统的政治顾问进行了一项民意调查，以确定克林顿夫妇的一个选民批准的度假胜地，定居在大提顿国家公园。
但对于拜登夫妇来说，今年的这次旅行是对这个国家的象征，美国人可以享受去年冠状病毒使他们无法体验的节日传统。拜登一家在楠塔基特度过了 46 年的感恩节。这是总统与吉尔拜登度过他的第一个感恩节的地方，也是他已故的儿子博和儿子亨特鼓励他在 2016 年竞选总统的地方。
“今年，感恩节的祝福特别有意义，”总统在周四发布的视频消息中说。
第一夫人补充说：“去年分开后，我们对那些我们无法计划或复制的小时刻有了新的认识。”
Even in Nantucket, Biden can't escape the harsh reality of the pandemic
Nantucket, Massachusetts (CNN)President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden descended on the island of Nantucket this week looking to preserve the sense of normalcy that the nation was so looking forward to over this holiday season.
The President and first lady brought a brood of children, grandchildren and their significant others to their island Thanksgiving getaway -- along with the Secret Service apparatus, small flock of staff and gaggle of reporters that travels with the president -- looking to send a signal to the rest of the country that it was time to return to traditions that had been skipped in 2020.
They went through their Thanksgiving routine: They had their feast with family on Thursday before walking through Nantucket on Friday, dining at a local restaurant and shopping at stores they have visited for decades before attending the lighting of the town's Christmas tree. The President tweeted in support of small businesses and restaurants Friday, making good on his pledge to shop small during that afternoon stroll.
But as has happened so often in the past year and a half, the pandemic is never far away for the President, as he -- like other Americans -- woke up to new worries over a concerning variant of the coronavirus spreading abroad.
As the Bidens smiled through their Thanksgiving traditions, the harsh reality of Covid-19's unpredictability interrupted the celebrations on Black Friday. Reports of the new Omicron variant of the virus -- B.1.1.529, discovered in South Africa -- prompted fresh concerns among scientists and the Biden administration. As South African officials briefed the World Health Organization on Friday, a new wave of travel restrictions were imposed abroad as countries like the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan moved unusually quickly to set new travel bans for South Africa and other countries in the region.
Stock markets in the US and abroad fell sharply Friday on the news, with the Dow Jones industrial Average logging its worst day since October 2020 as investors reacted to the new uncertainty of the virus's trajectory. On Friday afternoon, the President announced new travel restrictions on South Africa and seven other African nations -- a move that he said was meant to be "cautious" over a new "big concern."
The stock slide, reports of cases of the new variant showing up in additional nations around the world and travel restrictions on affected nations brought back echoes of the pandemic's early days rather than the optimistic view the administration has sought to project in the last several weeks. The news from southern Africa turned Biden's annual trek to Nantucket from a signal of better days to come into a message that the nation's new normal can be preserved -- at least for now.
Biden and his team view effectively tackling the pandemic as the only way for the economy to improve and for the President to recover his political fortunes. Questions are now circulating about how the administration will handle the new variant and its economic havoc, as federal health officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci warn that there is much to learn about how it spreads and how vaccines can fight it.
The continued economic fallout from the pandemic -- still far from over this holiday week -- was clear both on Wall Street and in the seaside town where the Bidens broke bread.
Conversations with local business owners and workers across Nantucket underlined the growing economic disparities between the summer season residents and many of the islanders who live here year-round. That gap has been exacerbated by the pandemic and resulting inflation, supply chain issues, labor shortages and a lack of affordable housing.
Richard Vargas, a manager at Murray's Beverage Store, on the town's main street, told CNN that the labor shortages mean he is seeing businesses having trouble "being able to gain enough people out here for work, people wanting to go to work, and getting the supplies to be able to provide a service for everybody around the island."
"There are a lot of hardworking people here," he said -- many of whom, he explained, hold at least two jobs to pay rising housing rental costs and to buy food.
Vargas, who holds a second job at FedEx, said a scarcity of J-1 visas for people coming to the US seasonally to work has also made it hard to recruit workers.
"We know there's a lot of people that wanted to come back this year that couldn't because they couldn't get a visa. It's just absolute craziness -- like, all the stores along here, any of the businesses over here, they say the same thing: They could not get enough help," Vargas said.
Biden is staying at the home of billionaire philanthropist David Rubenstein, a sprawling waterfront compound. But on an island often described as "elite," "tony" or "posh," the economic concerns affecting the nation are acutely felt among those who keep the place running -- the landscapers, the servers, the cooks, the hotel housekeepers, the shop employees.
Despite continued prosperity for the very rich, there is a "growing year-round population living at or below the median income level" and a "severe shortage of year-round affordable rental housing," according to the Nantucket Food, Fuel, Rental Assistance program.
Food insecurity is on the rise, with the Greater Boston Food Bank identifying Nantucket County as one of four counties in Massachusetts that have "seen their projected food insecurity rates increase by over 70.0%" in the past year, per the town's Nantucket Cottage Hospital.
And the labor shortage extends to teachers, police officers and first responders, with the Nantucket Current reporting in August that a staff exodus from the Nantucket Department of Public Works had "crippled" its workforce.
Concerns about the gap between rich and poor on the island were echoed by local business owners at the Nantucket Chamber of Commerce's "Business After Hours" happy hour Wednesday evening, with one attendee describing "the different Nantucket economies" of the rich and privileged and of those supporting their lifestyles.
It's no secret that presidential vacations historically do not reflect the experiences of ordinary Americans, from President Donald Trump's frequent Mar-a-Lago escapes in Palm Beach, Florida, to President Barack Obama's summer vacation in nearby Martha's Vineyard. They've often been aware of the political dangers in selecting tony locations -- in 1995, President Bill Clinton's political adviser conducted a poll to determine a voter-approved vacation spot for the Clintons, settling on Grand Teton National Park.
But for the Bidens, the trip this year is meant to be a symbol to the country that Americans can enjoy the holiday traditions that the coronavirus kept them from experiencing last year. The Bidens have been spending Thanksgiving on Nantucket for 46 years. It was the spot the President spent his first Thanksgiving with Jill Biden, and the place where his late son, Beau, and son Hunter encouraged him to run for president in 2016.
"This year, the blessings of Thanksgiving are especially meaningful," the President said in a video message released Thursday.
The first lady added, "After being apart last year, we have a new appreciation for those little moments we can't plan or replicate."
