There’s a middle-aged saying — Sometimes you’re the windshield; sometimes you’re the bug*. Lately, we’ve been running through a stretch of bugged days (more properly buggered) and that’s wearing on all of us. There are more of them in front of us and the Orange Fool is not inspiring confidence.
Whenever I find myself wandering down that particular rabbit hole, I remind myself that my grandfather made it through the First World War and the flu pandemic. My father made it through World War II, including being on a troopship that was torpedoed on Xmas eve while all the rescue boat crews were off celebrating the holiday. Remembering what my father and grandfather went through pops me right back to being thankful I’m not sitting in a foxhole dodging mustard gas long enough so I can go to a parade in Philadelphia on my way home. It’s a perspective thing.
No matter how much Pompeo and Pence want this to be a plague signifying the end times, I don’t think that’s going to happen. Once I get there, I can go right back to daydreaming about cruel, unusual and completely appropriate punishments for Agent Orange and his Conspiracy Crew.
tRump has completely screwed the response, just by being tRump. It’s who he is. He is being all he can be. It’s just that, that doesn’t amount to very much. Right now he is busy telling us that doing almost nothing is way better than doing nothing and trying to steal credit for everything positive that governors are doing to combat the pandemic in spite of the roadblocks tRump has put in their way. The only governors that tRump should be associated with are the DeSantis crowd of dithering deniers from Alabama, Mississippi, Texas, Tennessee, Wyoming and, of course, Florida.
When the amoral minority married the one percent and catapulted republicans into a fact free zone they laid the groundwork for this fiasco. They even created an entire “deny the science” industry. Climate change, tobacco, asbestos, vaccinations, evolution, you name it. If they could make a nickle out of denying the science they were all over bad science, unqualified experts and big budget PR lies. The glorification of stupidity, the embrace of racism, the chattelization of women, the dehumanization of immigrants, the worship of money and the programmed hatred of government are not a skill set with which to address a pandemic. Unfortunately, it’s all they’ve got.
We will weather this crisis, in spite of the inability of this administration and republicans in general to get out of their own way. We have no other choice. So stay home, wash your hands and most of all keep your chins up.
*Mark Knopfler of Dire Straights used the line in a song, The Bug, but I don’t think it originated with him as I remember hearing it used before the song was released in 1991.
Today’s GNR was brought to us by karij: This is not just my fight or your fight, this is our fight! Wednesday Good News Roundup