MONEY MISSPENT, VIRUS INSURRECTION, SERVICE IS THE CURE

     Billion dollar 'Raven' Stealth VTOL Gunship - Strafing Run - Ineffective against virus

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Image from The Guardian

This map from Foreign Policy magazine published 1 day ago. 3-29-20

Update from the New York Times 3-30-20

As of Monday evening, at least 160,718 people across every state, plus Washington, D.C., and four U.S. territories, have tested positive for the virus, according to a New York Times database. At least 3,002 patients with the virus have died.

Why were we blind-sided by the coronavirus?  Because we have the blind leading the blind in our national government.  The best money can buy, but incapable of providing for the basic real needs of we the people.  The billions upon trillions we’ve squandered on nukes, F-35s, border walls, tax breaks for billionaires, frivolous country invasions, pay to play national elections, military and on-the-streets weapons galore…just since our ramping up the War on Terror…left us nearly defenseless against a microscopic invader.

We have mis-spent our nation’s treasure.  One consequence is finding ourselves unprepared to combat this pandemic.  We are too good at endless war, and not good enough at universal healthcare.

Members of the inner circle of White House and Congress and lobbyists may get the coronavirus, but who amongst them will be without a ventilator if needed?  What we have here is not only a failure to communicate, but also a failure to commiserate--a failure to equally value and understand life of different income levels and social strata.  We have become a very divided nation, not just politically [huge gulfs between parties and factions], but crucially, between haves and have-nots.

We are becoming fundamentally, racially, religiously, and economically divided.  In the absence of any regular personal interactions or commitments between we the individualistic U.S. citizens, we more permanently form separate social classes. We are isolationists to each other, strangers to each other in our own homeland, and afraid of immigrants from elsewhere.  In the past it has been immigrants who have made us great, made us who we are—a melting pot of somewhat still courageous mongrels.  But our leadership is now abandoning us, and science, engendering fear—misdirected and chaotic uninformed and dangerously prejudiced.  Facebook cannot save us.  We need real substantial community solidarity.  Face to face, if for now, only 6 feet apart.  The graphs below from 2 states obtain if we follow social isolation protocols, worse if we don't.

When we recover from this pandemic, which we can and certainly will, we have to renew faith in Americans of all races, cultures, and incomes; and acknowledge our interdependency with all the world’s peoples and creation.  We should dedicate our resources to the provision of adequate health care, and living conditions, for every member of the human race.  Poverty, and war, and arrogant apathy about these, breed terrible disease. 

Graphs are from Washington State's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation

Let’s start acting like the developed wealthy nation we are.  The Bible states that from those who have more, more is required.  Practical measures should start here at home:  the income tax structure needs to be revised back in the direction of a truly progressive tax [progress for all, not just the 1%].  Significant tax increases from those at the top make an investment in the whole.  Opportunities for advancement of those in the middle class and bottom are obligatory for a healthy stable USA.  This redirection of financial resources works internationally as well [see Jeffrey Sach’s book, “the End of Poverty”].  Most everyone worldwide wants to be given just a well-designed step on a sturdy bottom rung of the economic ladder, so that their work to support and advance self and family has a chance of success.

tarting with a new Robin Hood tax strategy which makes focused investments in everyone’s abilities here and abroad, we can also balance our budget by decreasing our military expenditures.  At the same time we strengthen our posture in the world by transitioning from bombs and bullets, to real engagement: in the Peace Corps, informed diplomacy, shared economic development projects [to complete the Millennium Challenge which we waffled on], and AmeriCorps here at home.

Everyone able should be required to serve.  As President Kennedy said to a younger nation, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”  [And, for your world.]  This applies equally to rich, middle class, and poor.  The sickness which we now battle should make us wiser.  Much wiser than the man in the Gospel who went to bed smugly admiring his newly built second barn to hold all his burgeoning stuff, never to awake the next morning.  For us Christians, and all who would hear, this is Jesus direct recommendation. “But Jesus called them aside and said, ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their superiors exercise authority over them.  It shall not be this way among you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant.’”  Mt 20: 25-26.

We can no longer trust in blind politicians and corporate wizards, stupefied by their riches and power, who’ve become self-immune to the concept of service.  We must see clearly with eyes of informed common sense, and faith.  Competent stewardship is the true path to wellbeing and new life.

Could the U.S. been better prepared?--absolutely!   The Lost Month- How a Failure to Test Blinded the U.S. to Covid-19 - The New York Times (2) https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/us/testing-coronavirus-pandemic.html

Illumination art works by Kathy Brahney