Memo To A Moron

Memo to the Moron-In-Chief who has the temerity to baselessly question the need for ventilators while Covid-19 patients continue to die in spite of the courageous efforts of over-worked health care professionals in understaffed medical facilities throughout the country: ITS BETTER TO HAVE IT AND NOT NEED IT THAN TO NEED IT AND NOT HAVE IT!!!!

The Time Has Come

In the wake of the latest press briefing and given the widening gap between DJT's imaginings regarding the containment/spread/end date of the Covid-19 pandemic in the USA and the actual medical realities on the ground throughout the country, it might be time (past due?) for Pence and the executive cabinet to seriously consider steps to draft a proposal to Congress suggesting the immediate invocation of Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. Reinstatement of the president could be considered when and only when this crisis has been resolved by virtue of means employed under the direction of competent governmental leadership for the mobilization, execution, and ongoing implementation of science-based solutions carried out by medical and health professionals to whom we must entrust with the arduous task of ending the current national existential threat.

Worst Case Scenario Realized

I remember commenting to my wife shortly after DJT took office in 2017 that we must hope to God that the country will not encounter a real national emergency while this guy is in office. Sadly, we are all now experiencing the consequences of his complete lack of leadership, competence, and functional intelligence. God help us as we as a nation struggle to face this challenge without an adequate functioning governmental response. Let us instead turn to South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong for guidance and inspiration.

My Time

As of 8:49PM last night we passed the Spring Equinox and do we all know what that means, girls and boys?...that's right: we are now in the whacky and wonderful world of Aries where all things begin and anything is likely to happen. For some us lucky enough to be born in the shadow of the Ram, this is a time of raucous celebration, unfettered emotional expression, and nearly uninterrupted entitlement! So fasten your seat belts and prepare for the annual ride through bedlam!!

Perspective In A Time Of Crisis

One of the hopeful ironies of the Covid-19 pandemic is that it allows us opportunity to realize how we all are connected by a common humanity and the extent to which our individual survival and well being also depends on the sustained and durable vitality of our brothers and sisters everywhere.

Overcoming Incompetence and Inadequate Health Care

There are at least two major obstacles to our effort to stem the tide of this mounting pandemic and to flatten the rise in the curve of its advance. The first is the glaring and colossal incompetence of this administration in their slow response to the development of an effective test kit and the lack of foresight to plan for back up tests in the likely event that the original would fail (as it did). This error was compounded by their insistence to rely solely on the CDC to provide testing when the World Health Organization as well as private sector entities stood ready to step in and fill the gap in the wake of the CDC's initial failure. Trump himself passed on a golden opportunity to model the proper response to exposure to the Covid-19 virus when he refused to be tested after being in close proximity to the Press Secretary of Brazil's President Bolsonaro, an individual who later tested positive for the disease. Add to this his insistence on shaking hands (as did his favorite lap dog, Lindsey Graham) when the world-wide health directive cautions to behave otherwise. The second obstacle to halting the advance of this pernicious germ is the lack of universal and comprehensive health care for all people. Without this protection, the most vulnerable segments to our society are the least likely to access the valuable medical resources needed to limit the spread of the virus and, as a result, increases the chances of the continued and rapid exposure to and contraction of the virus by the population as a whole.
Both of these obstacles are correctable in the long term: the current administration can be replaced in November and Medicare For All can be become a reality under inspired new leadership and a forward thinking Congress that places the common good over other narrow, self-interested, and short-sighted considerations. In the meantime, we must rely not on those who would treat this crisis as political or public relations problem but rather turn our full attention to science and the medical experts whose expertise, professionalism, and competence give us all the best chance of survival going forward.

The Democratic Gamble On A Questionable Proposition

In the wake of Biden's decisive victory yesterday in the crucial Michigan Primary, it has been made abundantly clear that the Democratic Party has rallied around yet another center-right candidate to be their nominee in the upcoming election. Fueled by the fear of losing to Trump in the general election by choosing the least 'electable' candidate in the form of a democratic socialist, the party's establishment summoned their roster of 'moderate' voices in an effort to overturn the momentum Sanders had establish after his rather comprehensive win in Nevada. This effort was initiated by James Clyburn's endorsement of Biden in South Carolina and then followed by lock-step endorsements by Amy Klobuchar, Beto O'Rourke, Cory Booker, and Kamala Harris in the two subsequent Super Tuesday's. The ostensible reason for this 'panic buying' of the Biden candidacy was to 'bring the party together' by uniting behind the person viewed most favored to prevail in November and considered the 'safe' choice by party elders and their apologists throughout the MSM. Chief among the latter class was long-time Democratic operative James Carville who, in the immediate wake of Biden's victory in South Carolina, arrogantly proclaimed that it was now time for Sanders to step aside and 'make way' for the 'heir apparent' to party leadership. In so doing, he and the Democratic establishment signaled their intention to assert a conception of Democratic unification that included the coalition of older black constituents, white suburban women, and working class whites while simultaneously ignoring, dismissing, and otherwise disrespecting the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, many of whom had been working tirelessly since shortly after the disastrous 2016 presidential campaign. This group is comprised by traditional left wing loyalist and, more significantly, by an entire generation of young activists hungry for national leadership centering on progressive values of justice, gender and racial equality, peaceful resolution of political conflict throughout the world, and a forward thinking approach to the global environmental crisis with sustainable solutions to energy production and consumption. Make no mistake: the Democratic Party cannot be truly and authentically united until and unless it reflects and embodies the principles, aspirations, and values of its progressive base of support.

The selection of Joe Biden threatens to unite one segment of the Democratic Party at the expense of alienating an emerging base of support that promised to carry the Democrats well into the challenging and critical years ahead. Instead, the party elders are choosing to focus on a narrow slice of the electorate, many of whom switched from Obama in 2012 to Trump in 2016 as their target audience in a fearful and reactionary attempt to revive the success of a center-right, neo-liberal ten-year old political model. Adding to this enormous gamble is the notion that they can win back the White House with a candidate whose only credential for prominent national office was the good fortune to be selected by one of the most charismatic politicians in history to be his wingman for eight years. As Time Magazine writer Molly Ball astutely observed: Biden's recent, sudden, and meteoric rise clearly illustrates that 'things happen to him rather than he being the agent of his own success'.

In their haste to 'settle' on a single candidate agreeable to a dying contingent of party regulars and an antiquated 'Cold War' vision of the American political landscape, the Democratic Party is now on the verge nominating an even less formidable opponent to the sinister, pernicious, authoritarian, an decidedly un-democratic reign of lawlessness as represented by Trump, his sycophantic henchmen, and the white nationalist domestic terrorists threatening to end democracy as we have known it. Meanwhile, Uncle Joe is preparing to stumble through the remainder of this campaign season in much the same way he has conducted himself throughout his nearly four decades of public life: willing to be carried by the prevailing political winds of the day and rather pathetically depending the kindness of strangers, handlers, and those with pretensions to know the will of the people. He will continue to be challenged to construct a coherent English sentence, weakly appeal to a political mindset on the precipice of extinction, and desperately attempt to maintain a hold on any given train of thought before it inevitably dissolves into an irretrievable fog. Concurrently, an entire generation of potential participants will remain outside the process as a result of their distance from, distain for, and complete disconnection with Biden and the corporate-sponsored Democratic establishment he most certainly and loyally represents. The old guard stands ready to make one last throw of the dice in the hope that their myopic vision of the very near future will not instead result in the continuation of despotic, corrosive, and autocratic rule.