Thursday, September 24, 2020

WILL THE ELECTION BE ABOUT FEAR?


Every four years, it seems, we have “the most important election in history.” Exaggeration? Maybe, but I don’t think so, not this year anyway. While many Americans see November 3rd as  Biden vs Trump, others see it as left versus right. I’ve voted in every presidential election since I became eligible in 1972 and, while I used to be swayed by who the person running was, that’s not very important to me anymore. It’s the platform he or she espouses that matters now.

Over that forty-eight year span, my political outlook has moved across the spectrum from left to right and two aphorisms sum up why. The first is attributed to Winston Churchill: “If you’re not a liberal when you’re twenty, you have no heart; if you’re still a liberal when you’re forty, you have no brain.” The second is from that other British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, who said: “The facts of life are conservative.” Democrats are so far left now they’re becoming socialist.


In a February 17th column, I said Trump looked unbeatable, and he did. Then, in the last paragraph, I wrote something which has proven prophetic: 


But nine months is an eternity in politics. Anything can happen between now and November. Like what you may ask? The Corona virus, for one thing. Chinese efforts to contain it have been futile. So have their efforts to censor information about how serious it is. Their economy is slowing considerably and likely to tank. Pulitzer-Prize-winning science writer Laurie Garrett has covered first-hand over thirty epidemics worldwide and she offers a very sobering account of what we may expect from the virus now being called COVID-19. “The economic and political repercussions are going to be enormous,” she says.



Then, on March 16th, a British professor at Imperial College named Neil Ferguson issued a devastating prediction. If the U.S. and the U.K. did not shut down for eighteen months and isolation measures were not taken, he claimed, 2.2 million Americans and more than half a million British would be killed. American and British health officials — and President Trump —took that very seriously and shut down their countries. Thus, covid became the biggest issue in the campaign.



Ten days later, Ferguson said, Whoops! I was wrong! And he revised his prediction down. Only 20,000 Brits would die; half of them would have died anyway of old age and comorbidities; and the U.K. already had enough ICUs to handle the victims. But it was too late. The left loved the shutdown here in Amcrica because President Trump’s surging economy — his biggest asset for reelection — was crippled. The left and its mainstream media allies weren’t about to let it recover until after election day in November.



Using the British scale above, Ferguson’s prediction for the deaths in the U.S. would revise downward by 2500%, from 2.2 million to 88,000. Here in mid September the CDC has reported 200,000 Covid deaths, but in August the CDC said that only 6% of fatalities reported as Covid deaths were solely from the virus. The other 94% involved Covid, but the virus wasn’t the only killer. Nonetheless, mainstream media continue to hype the virus with endless stories about how many are testing positive and how many are dying. Is that because they want the shutdown to continue through to the election? Seems like it.


Actually, in June, the CDC estimated 0.2 % overall chance of dying from Covid


On my local Left & Right TV show months ago, I asked my left-wing opponent if there will come a time when we view the shutdowns as a major disaster far worse than the virus itself. Never before has there been such a drastic step taken to deal with a disease. Never before has this country shut down its entire economy plus its schools, sports, parades, churches, and countless other activities for medical reasons. Have our state and federal governments exceeded their constitutional authority? Have they violated constitutional rights of citizens?



In 1933, the US Supreme Court ruled that no governments — neither state nor federal — may exercise powers not enumerated by the US Constitution. “[A]n emergency may not call into life a power which has never lived,” said the ruling in HOME BUILDING & LOAN ASS'N v. BLAISDELL. Lawsuits have been filed in several states alleging governors wielded unconstitutional powers, but given the slowness of the judicial process, many plaintiffs will have gone bankrupt before they’re adjudicated.



Governors and other officials, especially in blue states like Maine, drunk with new power over people and economies, are reluctant to give it up as the virus threat fades. Have partisan politics controlled government response to Covid? Do politics influence research into Covid? Consider this: According to Federal Election Commission records, over $285,000 was contributed by CDC employees to Democrats, but only $1000 to Republicans.

Is it possible the CDC is hoping to sway November’s election by pushing fear?


10 comments:

Uber_Fritz said...

I am concerned with the validity of voting with mail ballots; that's my fear. Why? Because they are too easily manipulated. Thus, I will vote in person at the polls.

Brian said...

I agree that this is the most important election in US history. It will be a glaring statement about our citizens if they do not choose to restore dignity, respect, decency, empathy, and at least a pre-tense of honesty to the office of President of the United States. If Americans see a president blatantly acting more and more like an autocrat and don't have a problem with it, well, see Nazi Germany and other countries that saw the rise of "strongman" leaders. Strongman-dominated political systems usually share common traits. Rooted in a cult of personality, they reinvent reality, define patriotism to serve political ends, drum up fear about outsiders, empower security forces to operate beyond traditional law enforcement frameworks, and corrupt checks on power.

White House events are increasingly used to shower praise on Trump, as he pretends that the coronavirus is already vanquished — a false impression pumped by allies in conservative media. And he refuses to uphold basic Constitutional norms: On Sunday, Trump told Fox News that he wouldn't commit to accepting the results of November's presidential election.

And, Mr. History teacher, check your facts on steps taken during the 1918 pandemic. Schools and churches were shut down, masks were required many places, state governments banned public gatherings and shut down businesses like movie theaters, etc. Like Trump, it seems you want to ignore reality and history.

https://www.businessinsider.com/spanish-flu-pandemic-1918-precautions-us-cities-2020-4#another-practice-that-officials-specifically-in-massachusetts-believed-to-be-effective-was-fresh-air-treatments-16

The media "hypes" the virus because it continues to kill many while being poo-pooed away by Trump State Propaganda Media outlets and his herd of sheep.

Of course CDC employees are not giving money to the very imbeciles that are trying to ignore the scientific work they are doing! Duh.

What an incredible joke that you claim it is scientists trying to use fear in a political manner! There is no bigger fear monger than the buffoon in office, he knows it is his only chance. Fool his dopey sheep. Scare them! Fear the "deep state" that has Biden as a puppet, fear the swarms of angry protestors coming for your white suburb if big dady Trump is not in office to protect you, fear the "caravans" of rapists, murderers and terrorists swarming past his imaginary wall, fear your guns being "taken away", fear US politicians who should go back to their own countries...fear, fear, fear. Unless it is something that science says we should watch out for, then whatever, ignore it.

I have faith in this country. Trump will not win. And it will be interesting seeing him contest the election and get dragged out on his pampered big butt, maybe with crowds outside shouting "Lock him up!'.

Karma's a bitch!

Steve said...

Good post, Brian.

It’s the platform that matters to you? So increased debt, an abandonment of individual accountability, disrespect for the military and deference toward Russia is the platform you support?

Of course CDC workers contribute more to Democrats. When you have the Republicans largely suspicious of science, you’re going to have fewer Republicans in scientific fields. But instinctively questioning their integrity is symptomatic of a convenience the partisan segment of the Republican party created for themselves. It’s the convenient assumption that all Democratic supporters are craven political operatives incapable of objectively doing their jobs – educators, journalists, FBI, Department of Justice, Department of Defense, government careerists and now scientists. It’s a convenience, because it always you to reflexively reject anything and everything they report, discover or espouse for no other reason than because they vote Democratic. Conservative educators, journalists, law enforcement and scientists are unimpeachable in their proclamations, but their liberal counterparts are useful idiots of the Democratic party and never be trusted. It allows you to believe the Clintons run a child sex trafficking ring out of a DC pizza shop, but safely ignore that Trump’s campaign manager, Paul Manafort provided Russian intelligence with Trump’s internal polling data in the summer of 2016.

You frequently draw attention to your migration from Democrat to Republican, but all you really did was switch one ideology for another. When someone subscribes to an ideology, it means they stop thinking, because they are taught there is nothing left to learn. Everything there is to know is already known.

You can make a fair case that the facts of life are progressive and not conservative, or at least progression is the equal and opposite reaction to conservativism. Generations in power are that ones the set figurative boundaries. They set the boundaries between what is acceptable and unacceptable, what is right and what is wrong, what is reasonable and what is unreasonable. But the younger generations coming up don’t see those boundaries the same way. They don’t see them as what’s keeping them safe, they see them as what’s keeping them fenced in. Their natural curiosity, exploration and daring compel them to push those boundaries out, because those are the limits their parents’ generations put on them. That’s how life and knowledge and experience expand. It’s the natural order of life, at least human life. Pushing passed the boundaries set by others is what drives exploration, discovery and advancement, not by accepting what has always been should always be. Conservatism didn’t get us to the moon or circumnavigate the globe or incorporate Amazon, Google and Apple. Risk did all of that.

It's interesting you see the importance of this election. Brian and I probably see the importance of this election in like terms, but what is it important to you? Why do you fear a Biden presidency?

Kafir said...

As of 9/26/20 in Maine, there have been 5,235 CCP virus cases and 140 deaths. There have also been $27B in economic losses, 432K jobs lost and 1,026 suicides as a result of the pandemic. Impeach Mills!

For those who think there is not more at play here, I want to suggest you read a book called, “Unrestricted Warfare” by Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui.

Brian said...

I have to ignore any numbers being spouted out that include the unsubstantiated claim that there are "1,026 suicides as a result of the pandemic". One could just as easily claim that suicides are being driven because people are fed up with incompetent buffoon in the white house. Impeach? Nah, an election will do.

CaptDMO said...

I too must question the suicides attributed to Chinese Wuhan Novel Coronavirus-19
The agriculture sector has had a ghastly up-tick, for reasons unrelated(but not excluding), on it's own, for a while now.

Sami Gay said...

I come here for the comments. Tom's verbosity and juvenile memes make me yawn.

Steve said...

“Why do you fear a Biden presidency?” I’ll answer my own question. I gather two of your biggest concerns are socialism and open borders, but I don’t think there’s any merit to either concern. Democrats had the opportunity to nominate the declared socialist, Bernie Sanders, in 2016 and 2020 and chose more moderate alternatives. The fear of open borders has even less merit. Trump said that if you have open borders, you don’t have a country. I agree. I think of it like a cell. If the cell membrane dissolves, the cell dies. If the entire world’s population can freely enter and exit our country without any restrictions or check and balance, you end up with an ungovernable population. Society breaks down and will no longer be able to support a functioning government. Why would Democrats want to create an environment that renders them obsolete? Why would they create an environment that couldn’t support Socialism even if they wanted it? Both of these concerns make for great rallying cries, but they’re not grounded in reality.
I’m much more worried about another four years of Trump. In Michael Cohen’s book, he described Trump as saying he admired Putin because he was able to take over an entire country and run it like his own company. Think about that sentiment. The Constitution lays out our co-equal branches of government and the checks and balances that exist between them. That’s what this American experiment is. It’s what our democratic republic is. Anyone who professes to support, or swears an oath to, the Constitution should recoil in horror at the thought of our democratic republic beginning to resemble a Putinesque, autocratic thugocrocy Taking over a country and running it like your own personal company is antithetical to the Constitution, which millions have fought and died to defend. But Trump likes the idea. Then factor in the whistleblowers and inspectors general who Trump fires after they go public with his illegal and unethical acts. We have so much more to fear from four more years of Trump than four years of Biden.

Lisa said...

Asked if he would condone white supremacist groups Trump refused to do so on the debate stage. Instead he asked them to "stand by". That should go down as the most disgusting and jarring moment in presidential debate history. It is time to rescue the soul of our nation.

TRD said...

What a fascinating and revealing debate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5aM6W2HR_E