leadership

What’s Most Important


Reading time – 2:12  .  .  .

Let’s see if we can zero in on what’s most important about the Russian bounty on the heads of American military personnel in Afghanistan.

What’s most important actually isn’t that Vladimir Putin set up this incentive to the Taliban to murder our troops. And it isn’t a bit surprising that Putin has denied what our intelligence people have found and about which they are 100% certain. Lying and killing is what Putin does. Just ask his political rivals. Oh, wait; you can’t do that because he killed them.

And what’s most important isn’t that Trump wasn’t told what has been happening. There isn’t even the remotest possibility that our intelligence people, including the DNI, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, director of the CIA, National Security Advisor, Secretary of Defense and others weren’t aware of Putin’s incentive to murder months ago. And their being aware of it and understanding the lethal implications for our troops and our national security means that there isn’t a chance that this slightly indirect act of war wasn’t brought to the president a long time ago.

It was in the PDB – the President’s Daily Briefing – but, of course, Trump doesn’t read and rarely reviews any PDB and refuses to hear bad things about Russia. However, our security types know that he doesn’t read and would have brought this critical issue to this president in various other ways that would get his attention and focus. There would have been walk-in meetings; short PowerPoint presentations using only single-syllable words; crayon and coloring book narratives; and Choose-Your-Own Adventure comic books. They would have had a beautiful model in a tiny bathing suit and heels parade past the Resolute desk waving pictures of dead American personnel with captions reading “PUTIN’S BOUNTY.” Our national security people would have used whatever it might take to get this president to absorb the key information.

In other words, there isn’t even a small possibility that Trump didn’t know about this until the past few days, as he has hollowly claimed.* Even that isn’t what’s most important.

Here’s what’s most important about this scandal:

Our military people are being murdered and Commander in Chief Trump has done nothing about it.

Click this pic and watch the video. Then  send this to independents and Trump supporters you know.

No threats of military action. No sanctions. No “Back off!” call to Putin. No coordination with NATO partners. No counter measures at all. Trump has sold out our military people.

I really don’t care what Putin has on Trump – pictures and videos, evidence of money laundering, fraud, tax evasion, whatever – except when it results in traitorous actions against our people and our country by the President of the United States.

Our people and our country are what’s most important and Trump is betraying both.

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*From Congressman Brad Schneider’s (D, IL-10) newsletter of June 30, 2020:

“.  .  .   yesterday it was reported that as early as April, 2019 [emphasis mine – ed.] U.S. officials were aware of evidence of a Russian effort to pay bounties for the killing of U.S. and British troops in Afghanistan. Further reports indicate that President Trump received written intelligence on the Russian actions as far back as February. I spoke about this issue on the House floor this morning.”

Finally, a curious comment

The mayor of Tampa, Florida reported on Juiy 1 that they are experiencing a significant spike in coronavirus cases among 20- & 30-somethings. This comes just a few short weeks after the bars and restaurants in Tampa were re-opened.

I’m sure it’s just a coincidence.

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA

 


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

My Weekly Reader


Reading time – 3:57  .  .  .

We’re taking a break from the gigantic stories of the day, the pandemic, racism, our teetering economy and our perennially incompetent government to have a look at other vitally important stories that belong on the front page but have been pushed back to Section B beneath the fold.

Bully Barr

Did you ever wonder why Attorney General William Barr is such an immoral creep? Turns out it’s a lifelong obsession of his. Read about his commitment to being a bully here.

Popeye Point

There is a never-ending commentary on the Sociopath-In-Chief and the anti-democratic, self-serving and illegal things he does. So, it isn’t the slightest shock to learn that Trump begged President Xi of China to buy more farm products from the U.S. so that Trump could win farm states and get reelected. Hint: That’s the same kind of presidential election tampering that got him rightly impeached.

Meanwhile, there are the moral and ethical perversions of President Caligula that by now seem almost normal. Here’s a smart analysis by someone who knows a bit about such things. Rabbi Wolkoff has reached his Popeye point, where it’s all he can stands, he can’t stands no more.

Foreign Danger

Perhaps you think international affairs and national security are important things. I have warned about the danger to the U.S. (here’s one example) when weakened by things like a pandemic, a ravaged economy, deeply damaged alliances with friends, civil unrest and, of course, our sucking up to tyrants. But that was just me talking. How about the view from an expert with decades of experience and keen insight? Have a look at what Richard Haass, now President of the Council on Foreign Relations, has to say.

Anti-Corruption Wins!

Just taking a chance here, but you might care about corruption in government. I’ve done countless presentations on the corrosive impact of big money in government because it is both damaging to the Constitution and it’s anti-democratic.

For example, since those kids and teachers at Sandy Nook Elementary School were massacred 8 years ago 90% of Americans have wanted universal background checks on the sale of any firearm. Since that atrocity there have been mass shootings at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School, Mother Emanuel AME Church, the Pulse Nightclub, the Las Vegas outdoor concert, the Sutherland Springs, TX church, Ft. Hood, the El Paso Walmart, Tree of Life Synagogue and more and we still don’t have those background checks. (BTW – had those Sandy Hook kids not been gunned down they’d be entering high school this fall.) Watch this video (scroll down just a bit to find it) by the remarkably clear-headed and hugely effective folks at Represent.us. They’re successfully fighting the corruption that drives Congress to ignore We the People.

Migrant Health

Trump has waged a war on immigrants, regardless of their documentation, ever since the abhorrent escalator rant against Mexicans in 2015. That war went on to include his baby and child cage farms, his ripping babies from their mothers’ arms and separating them for life, his slandering all people from “shit hole countries” and far more. For those who have made it to our shores there is nothing easy, including healthcare during this pandemic, especially for migrant workers, many of whom are immigrants.

Download and read this piece of advice from Diane Harrison at HealthPSA.info and pass it along to those in need, because they’re pretty well forgotten otherwise. Like you and me, they want to live and they want their children to live, and that’s much harder for migrant workers in the age of coronavirus.

Dying for Leadership

It turns out that the Columbia University study that I reported to you on May 24 showing that approximately 30% of American COVID-19 deaths were preventable was right in concept, but things are far worse than they calculated.

A new Oxford University study detailed in “STAT” shows that 70% – 99% of American coronavirus deaths could have been prevented. That would have required early, aggressive, responsible, competent national leadership. We didn’t have that. We still don’t. One could argue that the avoidable death of 84,000 – 118,000 Americans is in the past – nothing we can do about that now. One would be right – and completely missing the point.

That same inept or completely absent leadership continues to allow and indirectly encourage massive numbers of unnecessary deaths of Americans. Read about it here.

Weekly Snark

Surely you’ll recall that President Trump proudly proclaimed following a visit with the brutal, murderous North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un in 2018 that they, “fell in love.” That suggests a solution to several issues.

Since Trump and Kim love each other, Trump should move to North Korea to live with his lover. Maybe Kim will allow Trump to build Trump Tower Pyongyang or a golf course at Mar-a-Demilitarized-Zone. Of course, since it’s a closed society and nobody from the rest of the world vacations there, both properties would go bankrupt. That would be okay, though, because for Trump that’s just another genius day at the office.

Also, each year the Darwin Awards recognize those who have done the most to improve the human gene pool by removing themselves from it. Could it be that last night we had 6,100 applicants in Tulsa?

Trump had bragged it would be 19,000 or 100,000 or a million, but he couldn’t fill the place – gobs of empty, appropriately blue seats in the arena – and there was no overflow crowd to watch him on the outdoor look-at-me big screen. Still, there were 6,100 Darwin volunteers. Thanks go to MSA for the Darwinian insight.

From the ‘Hood

10-year-old Elisa asks, “What’s orange and ugly?”

You supply the answer.

Closing question:

Trump is notoriously ignorant on even the most basic things. For example, John Bolton reports in his new book that Trump asked if Finland is part of Russia. Yes, really. That kind of demonstration of his boundless ignorance goes on every day.

He’s clueless enough that he couldn’t pass even a middle school geography test, much less succeed at a top university. Plus, payoffs are in his blood (think: Stormy Daniels). Given his boundless, bottomless ignorance and reliance on pay-to-play, how much did he or his daddy pay for his Wharton diploma?

Far more important: how much are we paying for his constant fraudulence?

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Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Emergency – Break Glass


Donald Trump has declared martial law in DC.

No, this isn’t a reality TV moment. This isn’t hyperbole. This isn’t a prank. This is actually happening. And he’s threatened to declare martial law in any state where he wants to deploy our military personnel to “dominate the streets” against our citizens, regardless of governors’ objections.

I wrote about and warned of this kind of dictatorial takeover here (see especially the last point) – also here and here and as far back as 12/31/16 here. It is no longer a theoretical construct. Now it has started for real.

Trump has been clear all along that he admires autocrats – dictators – and he wants to be like them. That’s exactly what he is in DC right now.

One thing we know about Trump is that he will keep pushing the limits unless somebody stops him. The attorney general is worse than useless to us in reining in this President. So somebody else better stand up immediately with a big legal STOP sign in hand.

If that doesn’t happen, there will be no election and our democracy will be gone.

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Here’s what’s behind this, other than Trump’s obvious sociopathic dysfunctions.

Trump knows that he’s protected by that damned Justice Department memo that says that a sitting president may not be indicted or prosecuted for any crime. Note that the memo is just that: a memo. It is not law. What needs to happen is for it to be tested in court, struck down as the poison to democracy that it is, and then put through a powerful Justice Department paper shredder.

But with that memo effectively acting as a shield to protect him, Trump can hide right there in the White House. And he needs to hide, because once he’s out of office he will be indicted for money laundering, fraud, tax evasion and more by the SDNY, the State and City of New York, the State of Virginia and some other states. An honest Attorney General will prosecute him for crimes while in office, including emoluments, the insane Ukraine quid pro quo extortion deal and much more. All of that will keep Trump in court and in prison for the rest of his life and will consume the rest of his ill-gotten fortune.

That’s why he’ll do anything to stay in office.

He knows that Biden will whip his obese ass in November, so all that’s left to him are cancelling the election and declaring martial law. It’s already begun.

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Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

What Have We Done?


Reading time – 5:29; Viewing time – 9:32  .  .  .

[Ed. note: Be sure to read the “Finally” section at the bottom, which was added after the video was recorded.]

It’s the Economy, Stupid

The White House announced (love that phrase – as though a building could talk) that it won’t update economic projections this summer. Think about that for just a minute.

Trump and his economic geniuses have proclaimed proudly and often that our economy would be chugging along at over 3% annual growth rate, what with Trump having ridiculed President Obama for his 2-something rate following our total economic collapse of 2008-2009. Now we’re in a [soon to be officially declared] depression, which is not compatible with Trump’s puffery. He can’t brag as the economy contracts 5.6%. So, to combat the impossibility of such bragging, the president will go on a Trump victory offensive: he’ll just refuse to talk about it. Forget that the President’s review of the economy is required by law. This is the Trump administration and he don’ care ’bout no stinking law. And who would hold him accountable anyway? That’s a problem.

7 Days of Trumpcrap

Trump’s standard playbook is to constantly throw crap at the wall and see what sticks as a distraction. He does this both to keep everyone else off balance so that he feels in control and to make you look away from his obvious failures. Most common are character assassinations, eye-googling innuendo, baseless accusations, outrageous policy shifts, stupid proclamations, repetitions of phrases as though he’s not sure he said them, and of course, general air head stuff with no apparent meaning. He never backs down from anything he says, no matter the idiocy he’s initiated or how harmful it is to others.

Here are some of the Trumpcrap distractions from just the past 7 days.

  1. Trump baselessly accused Joe Scarborough of having murdered a Congressional aide in 2001 at a time when Scarborough was 900 miles away from the aide. The aide was known to have had a serious medical problem and she fell, hit her head and died. That is in the coroner’s report. However, that did not prevent Trump from trying to smear a tough Trump critic with odious Trumpcrap lies and the media focused on that for days.
  2. Trump didn’t like that Twitter appended to his Scarborough smear several links to fact checks. He immediately threatened an Executive Order to attack Twitter, Google and FaceBook and released the EO on Thursday. He wants to regulate speech on the internet so that it’s to his advantage, an obvious violation of the First Amendment. For this president, violating the Constitution is commonplace. Doing so always manages to attract major attention and redirects eyeballs from his ineptitude and criminal behavior.
  3. Trump has commenced a full-mouth-press against mail-in ballots. He makes the same false claims that Republicans have been spewing for at least two decades, whining that our elections are rife with voting fraud. It does happen – about once in every 125,000 votes cast. See my upcoming post on Wednesday, June 3 for more on that. He claims that allowing voting by mail will exacerbate this non-existent problem. That Trump himself votes by mail doesn’t seem to him to be evidence against his claim, nor do the years of clean experience of mail-in voting in many states make a dent in his baseless accusations. But the Trumpcrap does distract.
  4. Trump called for an expansion of his useless border wall – he wants another 500 miles of it. You do the guessing about which Congressionally mandated programs will get cut to pay for his ego project.
  5. He reiterated his total ban on immigration, or at least his blatherings about it. He has been consistent in his disdain for non-white people who want to come to America, including those from “shit hole countries” and Muslims from anywhere. That’s always good for shifting eyeballs away from his failures and crimes.
  6. In the aftermath of the brutal murder of fellow citizen George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer and that officer’s indictment on 3rd degree murder charges on Friday, the president held a press conference. He spoke from a Tel-e-Prompter about the China/Hong Kong situation. He had no comment whatsoever for the family of the murder victim, the aggrieved citizens of Minneapolis or the nation, for the police, the mayor, the National Guard or the Staties who arrived to help. Nothing for any of them. And he took no questions from the press. Just another distraction, a blow off of Blacks and perhaps a concession to the “good people on both sides.”
  7. From “Stat”: “President Trump said Friday the U.S. would halt its funding of the World Health Organization and pull out of the agency, accusing it of protecting China as the coronavirus pandemic took off. The move has alarmed health experts, who say the decision will undermine efforts to improve the health of people around the world.” And that Trump idiocy has citizens distracted by yet another bright, shiny object of Trumpcrap.
  8. Trump issued a vague invitation to AR-15/Glock carrying “MAGA nation” to protest the protests across the nation over the murder of George Floyd. When these thugs show up, what could possibly go wrong?

All that and more in just 7 days.

This pile of Trumpcrap certainly does distract us from keeping an eye on the over 102,000 U.S. COVID-19 deaths and that over 30,000 of them were caused by Trump’s bumbling. It takes a big pile of Trumpcrap to cover that many corpses.

All of this is a huge problem that can be distilled by answering the question,

What Have We Done?

Donald Trump is the problem, for sure, but it isn’t just Trump.

Yet another unarmed black man has been murdered by police, this time in Minneapolis (again). The old semi-joke was about the crime of driving while black. That seems to have devolved, what with Breonna Taylor having been gunned down by police while she was asleep in her bed and Floyd having succumbed to a cop’s knee on his neck for 9 minutes. Now it seems the crime has shifted to breathing while black. Nationwide, we consistently refuse to do anything to make things better, so this story continues to repeat itself. That’s the driver of the protests in nearly every major city.  And some wonder why people riot.

We have allowed Donald Trump to break laws and we have not only let him get away with them, but we have allowed a corrupt attorney general to make outrageous claims of power for the president, to lie repeatedly to protect Trump and to use the power of the Justice Department to undermine justice in order to favor Trump’s felonious friends. Compare that to the justice for George Floyd and Eric Garner and Freddie Gray and Trayvon Martin and the rest. Cops killed 1,099 people last year; 24% of them were Black, even though Blacks make up only 13% of our population. Still wondering why some people riot?

What have we done?

We have decided that Black lives really don’t matter.

We have normalized Trump’s petulant tweeting and treated his rages as official presidential communication – even as policy proclamation.

We have tens of thousands of Americans so upset over having to stay home for a couple of months that last weekend they just had to race to a pool, a beach, a bar, a resort town and restaurants, leaving their face masks at home. Clearly, these weren’t destitute people who were desperate to get back to work to earn a paycheck so they could feed their families; these were people who had money to spend and who were aggrieved over having to endure a period of home confinement, what with their having had to order out pizza and play video games. Where did the American backbone go? Oh, right. Our leadership encouraged us to behave stupidly.

We have a government that is the very embodiment of George Orwell’s nightmare, where lie equals truth, up is the same as down and manipulation to benefit the few is taken for granted.

Big money interests have taken control of our governments (federal, state and some local) to the point that they can buy massive voter suppression and laws to their liking.

Roughly 40% of our country thinks Trump is just fine and they don’t at all mind his racism, his admitted violence against women, his law breaking, his abandoning of our poor, his cruelty toward anyone who isn’t a suck up, his having made us the laughing stock of the free world and his continuing demolition of our own democracy. It’s blind obedience leading us to self-destruction.

We did all of this, you and I and all the rest of us, either through ignorance or apathy or self-indulgence. Now we are paying the price in huge numbers of avoidable deaths, massive wealth inequality, such that millions more live on an economic precipice and we no longer trust ourselves to govern ourselves.

What have we done?

We better get to work to fix this stuff before it’s too late.

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Finally,

In that vein – we have to fix this stuff – try this thought experiment.

If the vast majority of protesters in our cities are peaceful as they vent their fear, their sadness and their rage, and if “outsiders” are burning down buildings, inciting looting and violence and inviting police crackdowns, who are those “outsiders?” To identify them, consider who benefits from their violence. Who benefits from inciting police and military action against civilians? Who benefits by being able to claim the need for crack downs? Who benefits by having an excuse to demonize Blacks?

There’s nothing random going on.

From reader and opinion writer Steve Sheffey:

If you don’t channel your anger into political action, if you don’t understand the nexus between rhetoric and reality, between politics and policy, then you are part of the problem, not the solution.

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Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Who Will Lead?


Reading time – 2:43  .  .  .

It has been clear from the start that the leadership of Donald Trump is of himself, for himself and by himself. Where does that leave the remaining 328.2 million of us in this time of worldwide pandemic?

Many of our governors are doing a good job with the limited tools they have. I’m thinking of Andrew Cuomo (NY), Gavin Newsome (CA), Jay Inslee (WA), Mike DeWine (OH), J.B. Pritzker (IL), Gretchen Whitmer (MI) and more. Some others are brainless tools, like Kay Ivey (AL), Pete Ricketts (NE) and Doug Ducey (AZ). Regardless of their competence, purity of intention (if any) or skills, these governors are unable to do what a president can do. Our problem is that this president isn’t doing those things either.

He lies about all facets of dealing with this pandemic, including denial that it exists and later denying his denial. Worse, he recommends dangerous remedies, like ingesting disinfectants and taking hydroxychloroquin, which has a proven potential to kill people. More worse is his absolute refusal to do the critical things needed to combat this killer disease, including (but not limited to) fast response, massive testing, tracing and quarantining and securing abundant PPE for our healthcare workers. And most worst, his total abdication of proactive leadership has led us to 100,000 dead Americans, 30 – 60% of whom were avoidable fatalities of his self-absorbed failure of leadership. He has disgraced the office of the Presidency to the point of our deaths.

Meanwhile, we hear messages about dealing with coronavirus from various other leaders, often couched in terms of criticism of Trump. What we don’t hear is clear, consistent leadership to get through this crisis. Who is beating that most important drum? Who is showing up on podcasts, in automotive plants, in press conferences, in meat and poultry plants and more with the exquisite focus and the clarity of vision we need right now?

My notion is that Joe Biden should be leading that parade and I wrote about it here. But Biden and we are months past prime time for this. And, no, a one-off statement doesn’t come remotely near to satisfying the requirement for the consistent message of leadership we need.

I’m in the “anybody but Trump” camp. Well, nearly so. I require a candidate who wasn’t fabricated in a plastics factory, and flamers need not apply. But if I am to put my faith in whoever runs against Trump, I want some demonstration of ability and worthiness to lead right now when we need it.

My pal John Calia writes a leadership post with the overarching message and title, “Who Will Lead?” and I think he’s spot-on with that question.

We are suffering nationally from the better part of a few decades of inept or counter-productive leadership both in the White House and in Congress. The reasons are as dispiriting as they are complex, but in the final analysis it comes down to things like integrity, accountability and actually giving a damn about this country and its people.

Trump is killing us and Biden is essentially AWOL.

Back to Calia’s question: Who will lead?

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Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Sacrifice


Reading time – 3:39 + 1:43 .  .  .

Tomorrow is Memorial Day – a formal day of remembrance for those who did their duty, put their lives on the line and died defending America. The flag-draped coffins continue to arrive at Dover, Delaware and, with the healthcare mess we’re in, it will take extra effort to remember those who sacrificed everything. Do it anyway.

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My friend Sheila Markin writes an excellent post and asked a question in her most recent offering. Here’s the background information.

Trump is now directing his campaign people to fire up the Trump raucous rally machine to drive numbers for his re-election effort. That means thousands of people will be jammed together with everyone joyously chanting for some Trump opponent to be locked up and doing that without a mask, flaunting their disdain for science. They’ll show the world they’re tough, rugged people and nobody’s gonna tell them what to do.

I’m just wondering how they’ll be doing 14 days after each rally. I get that Trump isn’t worried about that, because doing so would require empathy and you know the professional analyses of his ability for that. But there is obvious risk to these fellow Americans.

That’s what Sheila wondered about, ending her post with this question:

“Could it be he is so desperate he would sacrifice any number of his followers to insure his own re-election?”

Here’s my answer.

Years ago I had to deal with an individual who was a cruel man. His great joy lay in verbally abusing others and laying false charges against them, including me. Happily, that was a short assignment, but cruelty hasn’t gone away.

Today’s cruel man is the president and his cruelty isn’t just verbal. He’s allowing the preventable deaths of our people through his bumbling. And, with his claim of taking hydroxychloroquine, the drug with demonstrated, potentially lethal consequences, he’s setting a dangerous example that others might follow and which might kill them, just like his proposing that people ingest disinfectants. Clearly, he thinks our people are expendable, or he doesn’t think about them at all.

There are analyses showing how many more people have died and will die because of Trump avoiding doing what is needed to protect us – swift action, robust testing, tracing and quarantining, adequate protective equipment, leadership to influence people to distance, etc. It’s approximately 60% of our total COVID-19 deaths (more information here and here and here)  The numbers of excess deaths caused by Trump’s ineptitude are staggering. If you want to begin to grasp the magnitude of this, have a look at today’s New York Times front page.

But of course, they’re just numbers, statistics – until we realize that Granny is one of those people who died an avoidable death. So is nurse Sally. And cousin Jamie. And the pizza delivery guy and the EMT who answered the call and brought my elderly neighbor to the hospital, and the sanitation worker at that hospital, and the high school senior who was excited about her acceptance to West Point. These are metaphors for those actually afflicted. And they weren’t just numbers. They were very real people who died avoidable deaths. Over 60,000 of them so far.

Let’s make this even more personal with the closing words of John Donne’s poem, “For Whom the Bell Tolls:”

Each man’s death diminishes me,

for I am involved in mankind.

Therefore, send not to know

For whom the bell tolls,

It tolls for thee.

That notion hasn’t found its way into the Oval Office since January 20, 2017. Indeed, it’s an odd and cruel trip from “I alone can fix it” to “I don’t take responsibility at all.”

Now the cruel man insists that we “open up” everything, everywhere, as though that might be safe. 10 days from now let’s see if last weekend’s happy Milwaukee bar revelers are still well. They were crammed together, shoulder to shoulder, with nobody wearing a mask. And the meat packers in Sioux Falls and in Greeley similarly stand shoulder to shoulder. What do you suppose is in their near-term future?

I desperately want to be wrong about this, but I’m pretty sure there is a looming, now unavoidable catastrophe on the way. “Opening up” will temporarily goose the Dow and the economy, which is good for Trump’s re-election prospects, but the price for that may be found in body bags.

Back to the mirage of minimizing the infection and death numbers to make Trump look better to his believers.

This is not about the actual health of our people. All he cares about are the published numbers and how they make him look. Indeed, he has said – even seemed to boast – that more testing would make the count higher, which would be bad for his re-election prospects, so he keeps the count inaccurately, artificially low by keeping the country orders-of-magnitude short of doing the testing we need to do. That gets Trump his sick numbers, but makes us sicker.

To compound Trump’s dishonesty about this, we now have 3 states with Republican governors refusing to release infection and death counts. That’s a big help to Trump’s suppressing-the-numbers game. You don’t suppose those Republican governors received a call from the White House, do you?

So, Sheila asked, “Could it be he is so desperate he would sacrifice any number of his followers to insure his own re-election?” They’re about to be crammed together at rallies, because that’s what’s good for Trump. What do you suppose will happen to some of them 14 days later? Do you have even a whisper of a notion that Trump has entertained that question? Or whether he’s willing to sacrifice them if doing so helps him?

Sadly, it isn’t just his followers Trump would sacrifice. There’s a Trump-branded human sacrifice alter ready for every one of us whenever he hallucinates that it’s in his best paranoid, sociopathic interests to use them.

You’ve known since at least 2015 that the only thing Trump cares about is Trump. That leaves you eligible for sacrifice on one of his alters. If that’s not to your liking, there’s something you can do about it. Roll up your shirtsleeves and get to work to put Trump’s human sacrifice alter company out of business on November 3, 2020.

And follow President Obama’s clear direction: Vote.

Click here for a 37 second demonstration of how COVID-19 spreads.

Click here for Timeline: Trump’s Coronavirus Response. It will tell you all you need to know about what has caused us to have less than 5% of the world’s population and 30% of the world’s deaths from coronavirus. And it will show you why the majority of American deaths from coronavirus were preventable.

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Compare and Contrast

This is a true, current story.

British Capt. Tom Moore, the 100-year-old World War II veteran who raised over 32 million pounds ($39.1 million) to support the U.K.’s health workers by walking 100 laps in his garden, will be knighted in recognition of his fundraising efforts.

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson made the recommendation on Wednesday, and Queen Elizabeth II has agreed.

“I have, exceptionally, recommended to The Queen that he be awarded a knighthood, in recognition of his extraordinary fundraising achievements, and as a signal of the kind of contributions we will want to mark in the months to come,” Johnson said in a statement.

The centenarian launched his charitable campaign in late April as his 100th birthday approached. Wearing a coat and tie as well as his military medals, he pushed his walker lap after lap around his garden in the hope of donations.

He was trying to raise 1,000 pounds (over $1,200) for National Health Service (NHS) charities to show his appreciation for the medical treatment he received for cancer and a broken hip.

Donations gathered pace after his fundraising effort received national and, before long, international attention amid the increasing severity of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I am certainly delighted and overawed by the fact this has happened to me,” said Moore, who will be known as Captain Sir Thomas Moore after he is knighted.

The award is expected to be formally presented in the fall, with details of the ceremony, where the Queen will officiate, still to be worked out.

“I’m looking forward to that,” Moore said, adding, “I hope she’s not very heavy-handed with the sword, because by then I might be rather a poor old weak soul.”

After the fundraising effort, Moore released a charity single, “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” with singer Michael Ball, which became a hit, reaching number one on the charts and making him the oldest singer ever to have a number-one single in the U.K.

Moore fought in Burma, now called Myanmar, and went to Sumatra with his regiment following the Japanese surrender.

It’s clear that this gentleman is still the upright man of service he has always been. He sees his duty and does it. That’s quite inspiring in a time when we can use all the inspiration we can find.

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Click me

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Consequences In One Long and Two Short Parts


Reading time – 5:36  .  .  .

Part 1. Healthcare Wake-Up

The Kaiser Family Foundation just reported that, “.  .  .  nearly 27 million people will lose health insurance as a result of being laid off during the COVID-19 pandemic.” Some will go on the ACA exchanges; the majority will wind up on Medicaid; and 6 million poor Americans will have no insurance at all to cover the enormous expense of battling COVID-19 or any other malady and will have to figure out the impossible. Said another way, these folks are already struggling to stay financially afloat and a COVID-19 anvil may be dumped hard onto their little boat.

I know a fellow who commented on a different catastrophe, offering a Machiavellian (or Ayn Randian) comment that sounded like this: “It’s sad, but they made their choices and now they have to live with the consequences.” Is that our official attitude toward poor people?

We’re now being told to get out there, go back to work and go shopping, where we will encounter lots of nice people, some of whom will be disease carriers and may send us to the hospital. I worry what will happen in 2 – 3 weeks to those who are packing bars now and are not wearing face masks. Indeed, the CDC tells us that the likelihood of infection is growing greater in many parts of the country.

Wait, greater? And we’re supposed to go back to work and drive the numbers still higher?

Yes, because we’re warriors, wartime President Nero tells us. So, get out there and fight. Drive up herd immunity, which to the best of my understanding, means that those who manage to survive this deadly virus will probably have immunity. Or not. The experts really don’t know how that will work. And you have to get sick first to get that immunity but you might die from the infection long before you would have become immune. Further, well over 6 million Americans won’t be able to pay for their healthcare if they survive the disease.

Can we agree that we need to figure out the best way for all of us to be able to get healthcare when we need it? Actually, we don’t all agree about that, but the overwhelming majority of us do. If that’s the goal, then how do we get there?

What I see is that we’re about to pay for the healthcare, one way or another, for an additional 27 million Americans who got laid off due to the pandemic and who have little or no insurance. What if we just put on our big boy and big girl pants and face up to the facts that the bumper stickers are right, that shit happens, and that we think everyone should be able to get healthcare irrespective of their wealth? We’re paying for much of it anyway, so what if we were intentional and created a really good solution?

I can hear Libertarians wailing and can see Ayn Rand true believers bent over with cramps. I only have two problems with that rugged individualist philosophy. First, it only works for people who are young, healthy and strong. If you can’t check all three boxes, you’re screwed. Second, Ayn Rand wrote novels – fantasies – all of it was not-real, didn’t happen stuff. Doing so brought her fame, fortune and popularity with idealistic (mostly) young men during their formative years. Most of us grew out of believing in the made-up story not long after finding out that there is no Tooth Fairy. Sen. Rand Paul and members of the House Freedom Caucus, however, didn’t get the message and are still looking under their pillows every morning. Okay, that was snark.

We’re living in the real world where not everyone is young, healthy and strong – or wealthy. Not everyone had open to them the path to true free market enlightenment and success. Some are being cast adrift due to layoffs. Doing nothing while watching that little boat of theirs sink after the anvil crashes into it is a cruel consequence of our own design.

There is a Jewish imperative – Tikkun Olam – which means “repair the world.” The Boy Scout version of that is to always leave your campsite better than you found it. Pretty good ideas. No, actually they are imperatives. What repairs are we doing to leave things better than we found them? It is our obligation to our children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren and they are counting on us to do the right things right now.

Which brings us to,

Part 2. Napoleon

There is no shortage of commentary about both what Joe Biden should be doing now, as well as speculation about his relative lack of visibility. I’m reminded of a quotation from Napoleon used by Theodore White in his book The Making of the President 1964. White wrote,

“Never were Republicans denounced [by President Johnson] as such; the opposition was involved in its own civil war, and the president obeyed Napoleon’s maxim: Never interfere with the enemy when he is in the process of destroying himself.”

That proved to be a big help in sending Johnson’s opponent, Sen. Barry Goldwater, back to Arizona and I’m wondering if that is the advice Joe Biden is following today.

In that light, you must read Frank Bruni’s piece from April 26, “Trump Self-Destructs.” He ends his essay this way:

“Americans who take any comfort from [Trump’s nightly coronavirus briefings] were Trump-drunk long ago. The unbesotted see and hear the president for what he is: a tone-deaf showman who regards everything, even a mountain of corpses, as a stage.”

Which brings us to,

Part 3. The Math Update

Our first reported death from coronavirus was on February 6; the next two deaths were on February 26. Things ramped up slowly at first and then, as you well know, the death count ramped up very quickly.

It has been 100 days since that first case and we now have a minimum of 89,000 of our fellow citizens dead from coronavirus. We’re losing about 2,000 of our friends, neighbors and family every day, which translates to a Pearl Harbor every 1.2 days and a 9/11 every 1.5 days. The White House tells us that things could get worse and predicts that 100,000 – 240,000 Americans will die from this disease.

Well, things are worse right now. We better be really careful how we “open up” our economy, including doing COVID-19 testing in numbers a couple of orders of magnitude greater than we’re doing now or we may find out that the White House finally got something right – the counting of our dead. And that is a disastrous consequence of our federal ineptitude.

——————————-

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections. Refreshing when someone wants to get the facts right, eh?
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Mom


Reading time – 4:12; Viewing time – 6:53  .  .  .

My mother was a teen during the Great Depression and came of age during WW II. She was from that generation. Tom Brokaw dubbed it The Greatest Generation and the label stuck, this for obvious reasons.

This was a generation without a sense of entitlement, who followed the rules and simply did what needed to be done, regardless of the risks and hardships. And one of the things that needed to be done was to stop Adolph Hitler from brutalizing  and enslaving the entire world.

From the late 1940s through early 60s the world repeatedly came face-to-face with the indescribable evil of the Holocaust, as Nazis were found and prosecuted. Most notorious was Adolph Eichmann, the architect of the Nazis’ “final solution.” The death camps were factories of his design, created to manipulate prisoners so the Nazis’ mechanized murdering would be efficient. Efficiency was a proud trait of the Germans, so they put a sign at the entrance to Auschwitz, the murder center in Poland where 1.1 million people were gassed and cremated. That sign still stands and you can see it in the picture on the left.

The words translate roughly to “Work makes you free,” suggesting an entirely false and cruel promise for the future, if prisoners would work hard. Both the manipulation and the death were complete.

I recall with frightening clarity a conversation I had with my parents when I was an idealistic teen about those death camp horrors. I was raised in red, white and blue America, land of the free and home of the brave, so I said of the Holocaust, “It’s so good that that could never happen here.”

My mother gave a start and said (and this is word for word), “Oh yes it could. You better watch out.”

I had no idea how she could have said that. I mean this was the country of people wearing the white hats, who are forever the good guys. This is the country that fought and bled and died to kill that hate monster. This is the country of my dad, who, like millions of others, risked his life in combat over and over so we would be free.

Yet now we have a president who proudly tells us that there were good people on both sides in Charlottesville, one side of which was composed of white supremacist Nazis. We have a never ending parade of angry citizens carrying assault rifles to intimidate our people over any and every imagined grievance. And we have protesters who want our entire economy “opened up,” regardless of the mortal consequences to tens of millions of us.

If she’s protesting the lockdown, why is she wearing a protective face mask? Where is the courage of her convictions?

They’re carrying Nazi flags and declaring how aggrieved they are, this to justify their demands and their hatred. The president continues to tell us what good people they are, these swastika brandishing thugs. And not even a single Republican in Congress has the courage or decency to stand up and declare the obvious evil and hatred these people are spewing.

There was an “anti-lockdown” protest in Chicago last weekend. It was clearly a temper tantrum aimed at those in government and the dedicated scientists who are working to keep us safe from coronavirus. One woman at that rally carried the sign you see to the right displaying the very words of the sign at the entrance to Auschwitz. Her bottomlessly sad and incongruous companion piece is that her coronavirus face mask is a U.S. flag.

Another Chicago lock down protester with her hate on display.

The “JB” on that woman’s sign refers to J.B. Pritzker, Governor of Illinois. He’s Jewish. I’m thinking that her true message, as for that of the woman in the picture to the left who was at that same protest, has nothing to do with the lock down and has everything to do with their hatred.

That first woman was asked about her sign and she invoked the “Some of my friends are Jewish” defense, as though that would fully relieve her of responsibility for the vileness of her bigotry. It doesn’t. In fact, that claim is proof positive of her hatred, as she carries a replica of the evil, hateful sign at the entrance to Auschwitz. And the President tells us she’s one of the “good people.”

Don’t lull yourself into passivity, thinking these are just fools carrying signs. It’s what is in their hearts that matters and we can be confident that they, along with the self-important militias all around the country and the online hate spewers and the Nazi wannabees in their brown shirt costumes and the people who assaulted the Michigan State Capitol building with weapons of war strapped to them as they shouted their hate – all of them long for a totalitarian state aligned with their bigotry.

That’s the way genocide starts – every time, everywhere. In other words, we have the seeds of a holocaust right here in America right now.

It turns out that Mom was right. And I’m following her clear direction: I’m watching out.

Finally,

New projections are in, as two events are happening simultaneously.

The first is that the number of deaths from coronavirus are heading sharply upward. The experts (epidemiologists, not blathering, know-nothing politicians, economists or podcasters) tell us that by June 1 over 3,000 Americans will die every day from this disease (a daily 9/11; a Vietnam every 2 months) and there may eventually be hundreds of thousands of us dead, all things being equal. But all things aren’t equal, because at the same time as death counts are skyrocketing, the second event is happening.

At the direction of the President, states are incrementally “opening up,” meaning that more people are being allowed to open their businesses. Employees are going back to work and generally lots of us will be exposed to far more people, some of whom are undoubtedly asymptomatic carriers of coronavirus who will unknowingly infect many others. Maybe you.

So, while there is still a moment, I say au revoir to those who are in the coronavirus death bulls eye. Perhaps we knew one another – ’twas great; perhaps not. What’s for sure is that now we know that we won’t ever meet. One of us will have disappeared permanently. Maybe both of us.

And a large percentage of those who will die long before their time was due will depart thanks to politicians deciding that money and their elections are more important than your life. Too bad for you. And me.

Program note: Look for an explanation on Sunday, May 10 for why we don’t do the testing that is mandatory in order to beat this disease.

——————————-

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

I Know You See It, Too


April 30, 2020

Reading time – 3:23  .  .  .

The population of the United States makes up approximately 4% of the of the total world population. Yet we have managed to have 32.3% of all coronavirus cases and 26.7% of all coronavirus deaths on the planet. Even if all the illness and deaths in the  New York tri-state region are removed from the totals, the U.S. is still disproportionately sicker and possesses disproportionately more occupied body bags than any other nation. The math is right. The outcomes are not. (Ref: this post)

How has the richest country in the world, with first rate medical capabilities in healthcare delivery, research, development and the rest managed to perform like a failed nation with pitiful resources? That is the question that will be explored extensively over the next few years. If we are very lucky, the answers will give guidance for how to deal with the next pandemics, which are coming. If we can avoid our current self-defeating behavior, perhaps we’ll even follow that guidance.

Actually, we’ve done that. It happened following the Ebola epidemic ten years ago. President Obama established a standing group of 3 teams for the sole purpose of ensuring that we would be ready for the next pandemic. Wise move. Likely a life-saving move. But in his continuing quest to remove any trace of President Obama, President Trump disbanded those teams and fired all the team members he could.

So, the answer to the question about how we could be performing like a failed nation with pitiful resources is that we have a self-focused executive, devoid of the orientation and skills needed for leadership in a crisis. Everyone who is observing what’s going on knows it. We are left with little national leadership that is anything more than political posturing. Many of our state governments are similarly focused on political gain and they’re putting millions of Americans at greater risk in the process. It’s worse than no leadership at all, because it’s counter-productive.

I want to be wrong in my belief that this early “reopening” of our economy will produce a huge spike of illness with terrible consequences for us. I want to be wrong that the partisan cowardice driving these early “reopening” decisions is going to lead to a shortage of body bags very soon. I don’t think I’ll get my wish and be wrong.

Before the Civil War, escaped slaves would hide in safe houses along the Underground Railroad. They might spend a long time in a dirt hole beneath a cabin to avoid capture and there might be little or no food. Anne Frank spent 2 years in an unheated attic to avoid the Nazis. There are innumerable examples of people having to “hole up” for long periods of time, often in dreadful conditions, yet they did what they needed to do.

In contrast, we are being asked to stay at home with Netlix, home pizza delivery, video games, online school instruction and more. Honestly, it’s just a few inconveniences for most of us. We can wear our big boy and big girl pants a while longer.

On the other hand, for those who have lost their income and have no buffer, it’s a problem. A really big problem. Answer for yourself what you’d do to make sure your children don’t go hungry. You might be willing to risk your life working in a pork processing plant or a nursing home. Our federal and state governments have done a little to help these people, but no long term solution has been offered. That makes the future look particularly bleak for those hit hardest by our need to hunker down and many of the most pandemically dangerous places to work aren’t doing enough to provide protection for these workers.

Our government hasn’t figured out how to lead and deliver the healthcare protections we need, like extensive, universal testing, so:

  1. What are the chances the geniuses in DC can figure out how to keep our children fed?
  2. What are the chances they can figure out how we can stop being the world’s biggest pandemic loser?

——————————-

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections. Refreshing when someone wants to get the facts right, eh?
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Coronavirus For Dummies


Reading time – 3:41; Viewing time – 5:30  .  .  .

Imagine that in your town nobody has smoke detectors. The only way the fire department knows to come out and battle a fire is when they can see flames shooting through a roof. But when another house goes up in flames somewhere else in town and the flames are shooting through that roof, the firefighters have to divide their forces to battle the second blaze. Then houses catch fire on either side of both houses that were already aflame, because fire is very contagious. Then those fires spread to even more houses and the firefighters are soon stretched beyond their limits.

There was no early warning of any of these fires because there are no smoke detectors anywhere in the entire town. Yet with quick notice of a small fire from a smoke alarm in the kitchens of those first two houses, all those houses could have been saved. In fact, most would never have even become warm. Too bad nobody anticipated the obvious need and purchased and installed smoke detectors.

So it is with coronavirus. We don’t have the test kits, the immunological version of smoke detectors, so the fire of COVID-19 continues to spread, our people are falling victim to this deadly disease, we’re running out of places to store the body bags and our healthcare workers are stretched beyond their limits.

On April 16 Dr. Birx was once again on the president’s nightly circus sideshow and she smiled and happily told America that we have over a million test kits. Three days later on Meet The Press Vice President Pence proudly proclaimed that we have over 2 million test kits. But go to any hospital or doctor’s office and ask them if they have test kits for their patients and you’ll find out that they don’t have any or they have only a very few to ration for special circumstances.

Even if it’s true that we have two million test kits, they aren’t where they’re needed, and there are way too few of them to test sufficiently in order to protect 330,000,000 Americans. Indeed, in a report published last week by the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University they wrote,

“We estimate that steady-state testing levels that would permit replacing collective stay-at-home orders as the main tool for disease control with a testing—tracing-and-warning—supported-isolation, or TTSI, methodology will eventually need to reach a capacity to test 2 to 6% of the population per day, or between 5 and 20 million people per day.“[emphasis mine]

Please stop complaining about stay-at-home.

Simple math tells us that Vice President Pence’s proud declaration of our having 2 million test kits means that the total number of kits available in the entire country is enough to meet our national needs for between 2 – 9.6 hours. Then we’ll be out of testing capacity completely. We’ll be left solely with stay-at-home as our only prevention tool, except for those states where their governors refuse even that and, back to the metaphor, they instead encourage playing with matches.

You can read a most accessible review of the Harvard report here or download the full report here. The key point is the difference between what is actually needed in order to protect us and the pitiful efforts of our federal government.

The brother of a dear friend was in a memory care facility. He had some underlying health issues as well, so when he became infected with coronavirus, it only took a few days for him to waste away and then die alone. There had been no visitors allowed in the facility for weeks, so he must have been infected by a member of the staff. We may never learn who was carrying the virus that killed him because no tests were or are available to identify carriers, so the infecting goes on to yet others to become sick and perhaps to die.

So, I say with dripping, angry sarcasm, “Thanks a lot, Mr. President, for your intentional refusal to make coronavirus testing our national priority and available everywhere, rejecting the very thing all the experts have insisted for months was mandatory if we were to curb this pandemic. We might have been able short circuit the spread of this awful disease and spare my friend’s brother’s life had you done your job.”

Mixing metaphors, Russian roulette virus dodging is all we’re left with because of the failure of our national leadership. This has already sickened additional hundreds of thousands of Americans and killed more of us, infected by others who don’t know they’re carriers. But they would know if there were robust testing protocols in place. We would all be safer, but we aren’t safer.

This is what happens when those we count on to promote the welfare of all of us instead put on a daily circus sideshow, complete with monkeys in suits doing tricks and a magician spouting lies to distract us. This is what happens when a president abdicates his responsibilities to the American people in favor of blaming others and wailing about imagined grievances, most of which have nothing to do with our critical national need. This is what happens, back to the metaphor, as our houses burn to the ground and the president refuses to make smoke detectors available and even waits for weeks to send out the fire trucks, all this as my friend’s brother died alone.

——————————-

Ed. note: We need to spread the word so that we make a critical difference, so

  1. Pass this along to three people, encouraging them to subscribe (IT’S A FREEBIE!).
  2. Engage in the Comments section below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings, so don’t bug me about it.
  2. Sometimes I change my opinions because I’ve learned more about an issue. So, educate me. That’s what the Comments section is for.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine. Glad to have your corrections. Refreshing when someone wants to get the facts right, eh?
  4. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

JA


Copyright 2024 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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