Heads up to Democrats:
Trump is winning on the virus issue. People want to go back to work.
Thad Guyer brings an unusual eye-witness perspective to American politics.
1. He spends a lot of time in Vietnam, where people routinely wear face masks and gloves in public. The air pollution in Saigon is intense. Vietnam has 100 million people and 150 cases.
2. He just escaped out of Honduras on a charter flight to get Americans out and home. He heard the conversations of young people all around him. They resented the disruption to their vacation plans and work life brought by what they considered a crazy over-reaction to the virus.
3. He understands the liberal media bubble, but he is not siloed in it.
4. His political orientation is leftist, and he is oriented toward a sense of responsibility of the individual to the whole. We are in this together. From his military experience and his law practice, he is confronted with the reality that sometimes people--whistleblowers--attempt to do the right thing, but their "reward" for that service is that they are crushed.
Guyer is an attorney who represents whistleblower clients, with an international practice.
Guest Post by Thad Guyer:
Bob Warren is right: People Die in War, Except this Time the Sacrifice Should be by the Elderly
I had a bad reaction to Bob Warren’s message way back on March 10 in this blog. But now I think he is right.
I will not be willing at some point to have the American economy and way of life thrown into a 1930’s style depression with food rationing, massive unemployment and widespread misery in exchange for protecting the longevity of a relatively small proportion of the elderly from Covid19. Nor I am willing to see the bulk of our hospitals turn away other urgent care needed by younger patients because most of the beds are all filled with elderly Covid19 victims. I think it is fair that my demographic take their chances without causing the American economy to collapse.
I was lucky to be around as Peter Sage’s dad--Robert Sage--dictated his autobiography, and then to read the final drafts. Peter's father was an archetype of the "greatest generation," born in 1919, a youth during the Depression, a soldier of prime military age in World War II. It was remarkable how this public school principal’s life had been marked by his sacrifices during that war, seeing young healthy men like him killed by the tens of thousands. Robert Sage's view was that we have to sacrifice to protect our freedom and way of life.
Although I left the Vietnam jungles cynical toward the mission, I initially had embraced it with a similar view: The “American way of life” was worth dying for. War actually is not fought just so the majority can live. Instead, the sacrifice of the young and healthy is to die to protect a way of life, to prevent being conquered and ruled by others who don’t share our values. The philosophy is explicit: death of the few is secondary to the way of life of the many.
I intend to fight for my longevity, but I accept it as my fight, not the sacrifice of my son’s generation. Like Robert Sage and me as soldiers, we had to prepare for being killed in the war and we need to prepare now for being killed by a pandemic. Preparation, not surrender. But this time it won’t be the young and healthily carrying to whole burden of mortality, it will be the elderly facing a maybe 1 in 10 to 1 in 5 of chance of dying by disease. As Bob Warren put it in Peter's blog on March 10:
"There is no great harm to America if a large number of people like us here get the virus and die. We are due to die very shortly anyway. It's a grim fact, but it's a fact. I've had my turn. I have no regrets about that”.
Bob Warren said he “is not depressed or eager to die”, nor am I. I am free with my social security or retirement money, as is almost everyone over age 62, to isolate myself, to keep younger people away from me, to have the supermarket deliver my food. For the few I let into my space, I insist they sanitize and wear face masks. We elderly are not being sent onto the battlefield. We are being told to isolate ourselves or else take a chance of being killed by Covid19.
America should get back to work soon.
9 comments:
This is such a false choice you and Guyer are talking about today. As this writer says, "This is beyond immoral. It’s profoundly stupid."
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/26/coronavirus-us-economy-health-lives-trump
The picture you present is that sending the younger people back to work and to church will result in the same number of deaths. Epidemiologists are saying that deaths will spiral upwards among that population too if we lift restrictions on distancing. Then what level of depression would result?
Maybe the Democrats should should explain things better, but let's hope the focus is on the disease more than the false premise that lifting restrictions would restore normalcy. It's a good thing governors are in charge of the epidemic, at least from the prospect of focusing on the health of citizens.
The American economy, that keeps half the population living in poverty -- the working poor -- is not such a treasure that it is worth dying for.
It's not worth dying for United Health profits, to clear out space in their hospitals so they can go back to normal. This catastrophe is showing us how inadequate the for-profit health care system is when it really matters.
The American way of life, with greed and selfishness ruling every aspect of the culture, is not worth dying for. Best we can hope for is the crisis changes America for the better.
It's simply not true that younger people could return to work and be just fine if the US makes the decision it is willing to sacrifice 5% of the elderly.
NYC school principal Dez-Ann Romain, age 36, died of coronavirus after heroically keeping school open so that the children living in poverty, 75% of NYC schoolchildren, could get breakfast and lunch during a pandemic.
NYC nurse Kious Kelly, age 48, died of coronavirus after heroically treating sufferers in a hospital where nurses are now wearing Hefty trash bags as protection because there are no more gowns.
The lives of Romain and Kelly and so many more should not have been sacrificed on the altar of the American economy, so good at creating stock market profits for the rich and greedy, so bad at providing universal living wages and adequate health care when it is desperately needed.
I agree with the first two comments, that the spread of the virus will call more economic as well as more personal damage. I agree that our economy sucks for the people in general, and to sacrifice for it when it needs profound change would be a mistake.
Also, there is absolutely no equivalency in talking about older deaths and talking about the fetus. We allow for deaths in war, when a patient is flat-lined, capital punishment, people deciding to die due to incurable disease, and other things. We allow the humane taking of life of most animals. We liberals otherwise value each and every conscious and sentient self-aware life form equally. That includes most humans, some animals, but does not include a fetus! Science disputes when real human life begins. Self-awareness matters. A baby does not know it is looking at itself in the mirror until almost 2 years of age.
A fetus of four months is not equivalent to me, it just isn't.
I, at 76, am not done contributing to this society. Not yet. I will not go gently into that good night. I also have one other big credit to my name, ---- I did not breed.
I am 70 and am willing to protect my health and well-being, but I have younger members of my extended family with asthma. I do not want them jeopardized by the reckless re-opening of the economy.
Ireland and Spain, both capitalist nations, have each just announced they are nationalizing all their private hospitals so they can mobilize resources for the common good of the people. Yet some others in our country would resist using the opportunity of a crisis for this kind of innovative thinking and would instead send our country into a downward spiral as to both the economy and our spiritual life. Why>? In order to protect a system that leaves almost half the people living paycheck to paycheck?
I don’t want to be too negative or panicky, but this is really serious. We have no precedent for a pandemic within living memory of most people. Old and young and middle age people are all susceptible to infection by Covid-19, and if we do not work together to stop it, then millions of us may die needlessly. That would really kill not just the economy, but it would severely harm our society. Are you and your mother or child ready to die in an aborted attempt to keep America humming, by going to work and dining out ANYWAY, only to see everything collapse later from not fighting against the pandemic? I am fighting this virus, and I will not sacrifice myself or loved-ones for a futile gesture to "save" our economy.
We need as a whole society to do the Hammer and Dance strategy to stop the spread of Coronavirus. In order to save millions of lives in America, we need to Hammer down the virus by staying at home, or do solitary walks outside, to limit our personal interaction. Then when the PCR test is available to local clinics, we need do the specific "Dance" by testing Everyone for infection, and quarantine cases, and test people that they in turn may have contacted. This strategy worked in S. Korea and China, and it can work here in America too (see chart, ). The chart shows that about one million people will be infected in the US by mid April with business as usual, and 30,000 people could die, as we go higher in the peak of the pandemic.. But if we fight it, this can be limited to 200,000 cases, and "only" about 3,000 deaths, as the pandemic wave passes.
Listen to old Al Sharpton:
Morning Joe, TV host, 24 March 2020, Interview of Rev. Al Sharpton
“The problem is New Yourk has become the epicenter (of the pandemic), and we’re not even near the Peak yet. And if we’re going to use the Biblical language, I heard the President say yesterday that Easter is Special to him. Well, he needs to hear the whole Easter story: You can not get to Easter on Sunday without first going through the Crucifixion on Friday.
The Crucifixion precedes the Resurrection, Mr. President, and we have not even gotten up Calvary Mountain yet, to the Crucifixion. We just have the Cross on our back. We are going to go through a real Crucifixion, a real peak of this pandemic in New York. As Gov. Cuomo says, one that will go around the whole country, before we can get to Resurrection Sunday.
A premature Resurrection will lead to a Disaster. And we need to understand that, and deal with it, head-on.”
To suggest that because some politician says we should get back to work and simply deal with the virus is an overly simplistic concept. It dismisses the realities on the street; undoubtedly some will return to work and be more careful. But some won't out of concern for the spread to family and friends. And some will find workarounds; maybe a different job, maybe move in with relatives. I doubt that throwing money at the problem will have much effect beyond the urgently needed hospital support and patient care facilities. That old law of unintended consequences.
I'm probably too idealistic but I do think that we as a species are amazingly adaptive. Our government has already blown it. Now its up to the individual to do a reset, whatever that looks like.
Regarding the global economy, correct me if I'm wrong here but doesn't the fact that the entire planet is dealing with this suggest that all economies will shrink somewhat proportionally? If so, its no real change because value is relative.
A Modest Proposal for preventing the Elderly in the U.S. from being a burden to their children or their country, and for making them beneficial to the public:
It is unarguable that the elderly in this great country, through their dependence on Medicare and Social Security, are a huge drain on our economy. Imagine the amount of tax money we could free up if we eliminated the recipients. Modern medicine has enabled us to live beyond any reasonable amount of time, outliving the usefulness of our bodies, and our minds are feeble and limited at best. I propose building euthanasia facilities for those patriotic elders willing to make the ultimate sacrifice. (I'm confident that some of those who experienced their youth in Asia will be the first to volunteer.) I further propose that seniors sign in early before they become infected so that their bodies may be converted into perfectly palatable wafers consisting of either corn, rice, or soy-based flour (all gluten free, of course). These wafers will, no doubt, be very appealing and command a high price from the wealthy who are so adept at (and accustomed to) feeding off of those less fortunate than themselves.
Andy Seles
You really don't seem to know what young people want: They don't want you to die, they want you to get out of the way.
They don't want old politicians. They don't want old middle managers. They don't want the old deciding a future beyond themselves.
They definitely don't want some sort of idiotic sacrifice for "our way of life", American society or economy, or whatever misplaced idealism. They don't want some sort of "cultural jingoism".
And finally,they don't have the same mythology of American exceptionalism: They have a society to fix and want to get to it.
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