"Political Realignment and the 2020 Election"

 

Sydney M. Williams

30 Bokum Road – Apartment 314

Essex, CT 06426

 

Thought of the Day

“Political Realignment and the 2020 Election”

September 18, 2020

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

 

“I think it would be a great tragedy…if we had our two major political parties divide on what we would call a conservative-liberal line. I think one of the attributes of our political system has been that we have avoided, generally, violent swings in Administrations from one extreme to another. And the reason we have avoided that is that in both parties there has been a broad spectrum of opinion. 

Richard Nixon Speech, California Commonwealth Club June 11, 1959

 

There are roughly 250 million Americans of voting age, of which about 62%, or 155 million, actually vote.

Gallop, as of May 2020, showed 31% of Americans identify as Democrats, 25% as Republicans and 40% as Independents. Despite the growth in unaffiliated voters. the numbers lend credence to Nixon’s observation, quoted above, that both parties are “big tent” parties. It explains why neither Party has been extremist in governing…yet.

 

But will that happy situation continue? There is reason for concern. There has been an inexorable trend toward big government. Ninety years ago, Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal expanded the role of government and he attempted to pack the Supreme Court. Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society further inflated government’s role, increasing dependency on “benevolent” government. George W. Bush introduced the concept of “compassionate” conservativism, a euphemism for a more dominant part to be played by government. Barack Obama, with his call for universal health care and his vision expressed in “The life of Julia” of cradle-to-grave government, wanted government yet more powerful. In 1930, government expenditures accounted for 11.1% of GDP. By 1960, that number was 15.1% and today spending by government approaches 40% of GDP – levels last seen during World War II. 

 

Today’s Democrats, a Party once comprised of urbanites, private sector union members and leaders, immigrants, the poor and Dixiecrat segregationists, now encompasses suburban and coastal elites, Wall Street titans, tech company CEOs, globalists, academicians, government bureaucrats, public sector union leaders, the media and those in the entertainment businesses. Republicans, once the Party of fiscal conservatives, country club types, suburbanites, big business, religious conservatives and Wall Street, have become the Party of small business owners, the military, social and religious conservatives, “deplorables” (a catch-all phrase for working men and women throughout the nation, including those who believe in God, honor, duty, family and country), and a small number, like me, who put common sense above ideology.

 

The battle for the Presidency has become nasty. Each Party seeks to hold onto existing members as they search for new ones. An east coast conservative is now persona non grata at her or his country club. A west coast unionized policeman, no matter his or her race, is seen as the enemy by urban rioters. Using Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, the Left has waged war against the Right since the 1960s, bringing, as President Obama said he would, a gun to a knife fight. They weaponized the IRS to go after opponents in 2012; they blamed the murder of Ambassador Chris Stevens on an innocent Coptic Christian Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, who was jailed. They weaponized the intelligence services in 2016, first in an attempt to destroy Mr. Trump’s candidacy and, when that failed, to impede his Presidency. Republicans tried statesmanship, in nominating John McCain in 2008; they tried propriety when Mitt Romney headed the ticket in 2012. Both lost. In 2016 they went with a man without dignity, statesmanship or propriety, but a man who would fight back. They nominated Donald Trump, and they won. 

 

If the DNC Platform is to be believed, a Biden-Harris (Harris-Biden?) administration would mark the end of free market capitalism, free speech and choice, all of which have led to the most successful republic the world has ever known.  The cynical, naïve and ill-educated who now control the Democrat Party are directing it toward Marxism and socialism. Leaders have sold followers a false promise of fairness, equal outcomes, free healthcare and education, a society where identity supersedes ideas. There are those who claim the goal is democratic socialism, as practiced in Scandinavia countries like Sweden. They misunderstand. While Sweden does have a robust welfare system, it is not socialist. The means of production are held privately; the government embraces free trade; there is no state-mandated minimum wage, and families are able to use public funds, in the form of vouchers, to finance their children’s education at private schools. As expressed by far-left Democrats, Socialism is authoritarian; it is McCarthyism; it suppresses individualism and free expression.

 

Socialism is a means to power for politicians and plutocrats who support them, like Michael Bloomberg who announced he will spend $100 million to help Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump in Florida. For the electorate, however, it is a trip into a dark and dystopian land. In her book Great Society, Amity Schlaes wrote about the siren call of socialism in the 1960s, a comment relevant today: “Socialism was so broad, vague and romantic that it was harder to discredit…So long as socialism was never complete, as long as socialists were still protesting and building, no one could dismiss socialism. That was the beauty of it.” Those who advocate socialism never identify it with the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (Nazis), Cuba, Venezuela, or Communists in China and the old Soviet Union. Besides backing genocide (Nazis, Soviets and the Chinese), Socialism opens a back door that lets in restrictions on liberty, innovation, aspiration and hope. It will result in higher taxes for everyone. Ultimately, it leads to totalitarianism.

 

Democrats have become the Party of elites, forgetful of past supporters and disdainful of plebian opponents. Fearful of a Trump victory, they and a few “never-Trumpers” recently formed the Transition Integrity Project, a deceptively grandiose name for an authoritarian plan that would ensure no peaceful transition of power takes place, should Mr. Trump win re-election. Many blacks and Hispanics, once taken for granted by Democrats who purchased their allegiance through government payments, now realize they have been duped. “What do have to lose?” is the way President Trump put it at the Republican Convention when asking for their support. Republicans offer opportunity to minorities, while Democrats offer bounty. Blacks and Hispanics recognize dependency on government does not lead to success and happiness, that jobs bring dignity and that the traditional family matters. Thus, they have been leaving the Democrat Party. Mr. Trump’s percentage of their votes in November is likely to be the highest for any Republican in more than half a century. As well, immigrants who have come legally to these shores from Eastern Europe and Latin America understand that Socialism is not the panacea claimed. Freedom remains a powerful lure.

 

The last major political realignment was in the 1960s, when President Johnson’s promise of “guns and butter” caused blacks to migrate to the Democrat Party, and Nixon’s Southern Strategy brought conservative Southern whites into the Republican fold. We are now witness to another change. Nixon’s words, in the rubric above, were spoken at the end of the Eisenhower era, a time long past. Extremists have taken control of the Democrat Party. With “cancel culture,” a “broad spectrum of opinion” no longer exists. Will it cost them the election? We better hope it does.

"Technology and Politics"

                                                                    Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

 

Thought of the Day

“Technology and Politics”

August 28, 2020

 

“The successor to politics will be propaganda, not in the sense of a message or ideology,

 but the impact of the whole technology of the times. So, politics will eventually be replaced

 by imagery. The politician will be only too happy to abdicate in favor of his image,

 because the image will be so much more powerful than he could ever be.”

                                                                                                            Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980)

                                                                                                            Interview with Peter Newman

                                                                                                            Editor-in-Chief, MacLean’s, 1972

 

A friend recently sent an e-mail in which he pointed out that Apple had installed, without my knowledge, a COVID-19 sensor app on my iPhone. The app notifies me if I’ve been near someone that has been reported as having COVID-19. My iPhone already knows where I am. Now it will know with whom I meet and speak. How soon before it knows if I am with a Communist, a neo-Nazi or a supporter of Trump?  At five months shy of eighty, the old man in me says it is good for my phone to know where I am. On the other hand, the libertarian in me says, whoa! Do I really want to live in a society where government, or some organization, tracks my every move and knows with whom I associate?

 

We live in an extraordinary time, where advances in technology outpace our ability to understand their consequences. Absent a return to a new Dark Age, technological advances will persist. It is the potential to manipulate thoughts and actions that should concern us. “Communism is a monopolistic system, economically and politically. The system suppresses individual initiative, and the 21^st Century is all about individualism and freedom. The development of technology supported those directions.” So spoke Lech Walesa in a 2002 interview with Julia Scheeres in a June 2002 interview for Wired. Eighteen years later, technology has advanced beyond what most people thought possible twenty years ago. Today, our every movements can be monitored. Individual freedom has bowed to the happiness of security and the collective promise of Socialism. Over seventy years ago, George Orwell saw this coming: “The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better.”

 

Dystopian novels, from H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine, George Orwell’s 1984, to Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 have shown how a repressive society can be propagandized a utopian future. It is the promise of Socialism, Communism and Nazism, where ends justify means. In words that provide an eerie precursor to the cancel culture that led to the New York Times 1619 Project, George Orwell, in 1949, wrote in his novel 1984: “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”

 

The American people have been softened up, made susceptible to state control. Universities have banned conservative speech. Political correctness and identity politics have put a damper on open debate. Violent protest groups, like Black Lives Matter and Antifa, with their demands for blind allegiance, have wrecked the businesses and destroyed the lives of those they claim to represent. The reaction to COVID-19 has been Orwellian, in the herding of people to obeisance without questioning the diktats of government. Forty-three states imposed lockdowns, directing residents to stay home, except for essential needs. In New York, reminiscent of Nazi Germany, COVID-19 residents were placed in nursing homes amidst the uninfected, thereby endangering and killing thousands. Businesses deemed nonessential were closed. Over twenty million American were unemployed by May, up from just over six million in February. Social distancing and masks are commonplace and Vice President Joe Biden has said that if he is elected President masks will be mandated. Schools and colleges were closed. According to the CDC, one in four young people between the ages of 18 and 24 seriously contemplated suicide this summer. A line attributed to Mark Twain is relevant: “It is easier to fool the people than to convince them they have been fooled.” Progress has always relied on the initiative of the individual, not robotic responses of the masses to bureaucratic orders.

 

A concern about the size and power of government is not new. In a letter dated 27 May 1788, Thomas Jefferson wrote to fellow Virginian Edward Carrington: “The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and for government to gain ground.” Any aspirant federal employee wants to see his or her agency expand. Wishes have been realized. The budget of the federal government, now with 2.6 million employees, has grown from 8.7% of GDP in 1960 to 22.2% of GDP today.

 

What does this portend? California, a blue state run for years by progressive Democrats, may offer a clue. “California,” as resident Victor Davis Hanson wrote this month in National Review, “as some of the Democratic primary candidates bragged last year, is the progressive model of the future.” Not many years ago, the state was known as the “Golden State,” named after the gold rush of 1848 and the fields of golden poppies (Eschscholzia californica) that appear each year across its land. The state’s cliff-lined beaches, giant Redwoods, the magic of Hollywood and its once beautiful cities of Los Angeles and San Francisco lured people from across the country and around the world. Silicon Valley made billionaires of risk-taking technologists. Today, California has more billionaires than any other state. It has the highest GDP of any state (eight highest on a per capita basis). But the state is the most heavily taxed in the nation and has the fourth highest income gap of any state in the union, with one fifth of its residents living below the poverty line. With 12% of the country’s population, it has half the nation’s homeless and a third of its welfare recipients. Its public schools rank near the nation’s bottom, and the state is subject to human-caused droughts and power blackouts. Should this be the model to which we aspire? In his article, Mr. Hanson concluded that California is “now a civilization in near ruins.”

 

As politics is always about power, allow me to add one more quote from Orwell’s 1984. “Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes a revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.” For Americans, whose revolution established a republic, that statement may seem amiss, but consider the French Revolution of 1789-1799, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Chinese Revolution of 1949. Beware of promises and the kindness of strangers.

 

At the Democratic National Convention, President Obama, in seductive mellifluous tones (in contrast to President Trump’s impolitic words), told the world that, with the upcoming election, democracy is on the line. I agree. But the policies of which Party would cause democracy to tremble? Which Party is more likely to use technology to help educate, influence and control the American people? The one that supports individualism or the one that created “Julia’s World?” Which Party advocates lower taxes, less regulation, smaller government and increased self-reliance, and which supports higher taxes, increased regulation, bigger government and greater dependency? Which Party sees immigrants as opportunists, and which sees them as victims? This election is crucial. Democracy is on the line. Is the COVID-19 app on my iPhone a canary in the coal mine? Shall we blindly allow technocratic bureaucrats to intrude in our lives, or should we try to understand the consequences of what technology has done to politics?

 

 

 

"Patriotism and the Mount Rushmore Speech"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Patriotism and the Mount Rushmore Speech”

July 9, 2020

“The essence of America, that which really unites us, is not ethnicity, or nationality or religion.

It is an idea, and what an idea it is – that you can come from humble circumstances and do great things.”

                                                                                    Condoleezza Rice (1954-)

                                                                                    Former Secretary of State

                                                                                    Republican National Convention, August 29, 2012

“Patriotism,” said Samuel Johnson in 1775, “is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” A little more than a hundred years later, Oscar Wilde wrote, “Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.” In 1906, Ambrose Bierce published The Devils Dictionary. In it he accused Samuel Johnson of being too gentle; Bierce defined patriotism as “the first resort of the scoundrel.”  From Mark Twain to H.L. Mencken, wits have had great fun belittling patriots and patriotism.

Patriotism is a positive force. In a cynical age, patriotism appears dated; it is out of sync with progressive beliefs. But true patriotism is deeply embedded. It accepts and withstands criticism. In Notes of a Native Son (1955), James Baldwin wrote: “I love America more than any other country in this world and exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.” That is as it should be – the right to criticize is implicit in free speech. Patriotism is devotion and attachment to one’s homeland and fellow citizens; it does not mean total obeisance, as is required by those from Black Lives Matter and Antifa. Patriotism should not be confused with nationalism, which is divisive, intolerant and nihilistic. In a multiracial and multicultural country, patriotism is what binds a disparate people. Patriotism is inclusive and feeds on love, while nationalism is partisan and is nourished by hate.

Patriotism was the theme of President Trump’s speech at Mount Rushmore on July 3^rd. That was as it should be, as the United States celebrated its 244^th birthday. If one were to read only the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, or the start of Associated Press’ Jill Colvin’s postmortem, “After a weekend spent stoking division, President Donald Trump…”, one would conclude that Mr. Trump’s speech in South Dakota was dark and divisive. However, if one read it, without knowledge of the speaker, it would appear uplifting and optimistic.

Surprisingly, President Trump delivers a good speech. While he does not write his speeches – no President has since Warren Harding hired Judson Welliver as his literary clerk – the words, when he does not stray from the script, are powerful and inspiring. (His speeches should be read, which is my preference.) On July 16, 2017 in Warsaw, Mr. Trump warned of the steady creep of government bureaucracy, “invisible to some but familiar to the Poles…The West became great not because of paperwork and regulations but because people were allowed to chase their dreams and pursue their destinies.” In this year’s State of the Union, he spoke of years of political stalemate and the divisions it has caused: “We must choose between greatness or gridlock, results or resistance, vision or vengeance, incredible progress or pointless destruction.” He ended that speech optimistically, by asking the men and women of Congress to look at the opportunities that lie ahead: “Our most thrilling achievements are still ahead. Our most exciting journeys still await. Our biggest victories are still to come. We have not yet begun to dream.”

President Trump spoke at Mount Rushmore: “Our founders launched not only a revolution in government, but a revolution in the pursuit of justice, equality, liberty and prosperity… No country has done more,” he added, “to advance the human condition than the United States of America.” He then spoke of the current campaign to “wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values and indoctrinate our children.” The weapon of these advocates is a “cancel culture” that “shames dissenters” and “demands absolute allegiance. If you do not speak its language, perform its rituals, recite its mantras, and follow its commandments, then you will be censored, banished, blacklisted, persecuted, and punished.”  Those were the words alluded to by mainstream media as dystopian. He went on to remind the audience that “nations exist to protect the safety and happiness of their own people…We believe in equal opportunity, equal justice, and equal treatment for all citizens of every race, background, religion and creed.”  He was lighting a candle, not snuffing one out. Yet, this was the speech CBS described as being “fiery,” CNN claimed included “outrageous lies,” and the New York Times said was a “divisive culture war message.”

The speech offended the left, who called it “a battle cry.” In that, they were correct. It was a battle cry for liberty against forces of darkness that want to eradicate our past by desecrating statues and monuments. It was battle cry against the re-education of youth, like the phony narrative of the 1619 project – a project that perverts those who fought for liberty and independence into progenitors of oppression. Our Founders were not paragons of perfection, but neither were they Simon Legrees. The enemy within us is the one that wants to stifle opposing opinions, to “cancel” culture and history. This enemy has totalitarian instincts, demands allegiance from the “woke” and commands others to kneel in homage to their vision. It is a frightening prospect, reminiscent of Jacobin France and China’s cultural revolution.

He ended by saying he was signing an executive order to establish a “National Garden of American Heroes, a vast outdoor park that will feature the statues of the greatest Americans to ever live.” Of the thirty figures mentioned in the E.O., 57% are white men, 27% women and 17% Blacks. Certainly, there will be debate as to who will be included. For example, four missing that I thought should be added: Daniel Webster, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Oliver Wendell Holmes and, of course, my four-greats grandfather, Noah Webster.

Patriotism is many things: respect for one’s country’s history and uniqueness, symbolized by its flag. In the U.S., it is based on natural rights and elevates the individual; it is the recognition that we are a nation of laws, not men; it is tolerance for those of opposing opinions and the willingness to accept criticism. Patriotism was extant in Martin Luther King’s words when he spoke at the Lincoln Memorial in 1963 of the Founders “…promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” words that lead to the passage of the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965.

America does not need to be “transformed,” as Mr. Biden urged last weekend. We are not perfect, but we are more perfect than other nations. We look to the future, while guided by mistakes of the past. We focus on liberty and ensure that everyone is equal before the law. We strive for equality of opportunities but keep in mind the universal moral truths of the Founders’ words, and we never forget that individual liberty is our greatest asset – the freedom for everyone to achieve his or her dream, as Condoleezza Rice told the Republican convention in 2012. That was the nub of Mr. Trump’s speech last Friday at Mount Rushmore.

Each of us is unique. We are multiracial and come from myriad cultures yet are bound by love for country. We applaud our nation’s ideals yet acknowledge her imperfections. And we understand it is patriotism that encompasses the “Unum,” in the motto of the Great Seal of the United States, E Pluribus Unum.

"COVID-19 - Dissension Not Allowed"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com 

Thought of the Day

“COVID-19 – Dissension Not Allowed”

April 22, 2020

“I own I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.”

                                                                                                            Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

                                                                                                            Letter to James Madison, 1787

Our reaction to COVID-19 has shown the best of us, but also the worst. Protection of the vulnerable – the elderly and those defenseless because of preconditions, ranging from obesity to diabetes – has been admirable. Healthcare workers willingly expose themselves to a novel virus, despite conflicting and changing reports as to its cause, properties, transmission and morbidity rates. Until recently, most of us have complied without complaint, acting with ovine-like acquiescence to draconian measures that have led to a “lockdown” of the economy and the loss of millions of jobs.

We obey common-sensical rules about social-distancing, wearing face masks, scrubbing our hands, not touching our face, sneezing into a Kleenex, and using gloves and disinfectants. Anything to slow the rate of infection of a highly contagious virus. But the lockdown of two thirds of the economy (as measured by those who do not have the option to work from home) has been pre-empted from debate. As well, some political leaders have taken lockdowns of the economy to an extreme – banning yard work, home construction projects or preventing citizens from using parks or playing golf. Some governors have used the pandemic as an excuse to get the federal government to help bailout their states’ finances. Others have talked of using Drones to monitor people’s behavior. Debate, as to the cause of COVID-19, is discouraged, as is seen in the disparagements of President Trump for calling the virus a Chinese or Wuhan virus, despite indisputable evidence that that was its origin. Those who raise questions about COVID-19 are called “anti-science,” in spite of the fact that the science regarding the virus, its characteristics, transmission and morbidity rates keep changing. We cannot forget we are in an election year. Republicans, who would like to keep the Presidency and the Senate and re-gain the House, would like to get the economy re-started as soon as possible, but without initiating a second surge of the virus. Democrats recognize that the economy has been Republicans’ strongest suit, so have an interest in the economic downturn lasting longer.

This debate favors Democrats, as we will not be totally free of the virus until a vaccine arrives, and that may be a year to eighteen months away – too long for any of us, Republican or Democrat. While the virus appears to have peaked, or to be peaking, deaths will continue to mount, especially given the way they are now counted. So, a restart of the economy will be accompanied by deaths that will be said to be caused by COVID-19 and are a consequence of a premature re-opening of the economy. Any restart will be slow, as people will be nervous and social distancing will remain in effect, whether by rule or by habit, which means that busses, subways, trains and planes will be slow to recover ridership. Most people will not immediately pile into crowded bars, restaurants or stores. It is hard to envision the economy coming back in “V” fashion. Too much damage has been done to people’s confidence. Republicans, in wanting to restart the economy, are in the right, in my opinion, but they have the tougher side of the argument.

Because of the extreme measures adopted, in respect to our economy, both parties, along with scientists, the task force and the CDC, have a self-interest in COVID-19 being seen as the most virulent of viruses to ever hit our shores. How else to explain the draconian measures taken?  It is cited as worse than the Spanish Flu of 1918, with 675,000 deaths in the U.S.; the Asian Flu of 1958, with 116,000 American deaths, and the Asian Flu of 1968, which killed 100,000 in the U.S. In none of those case was the U.S. economy shuttered as it has been in this instance. (Keep in mind, the populations in the U.S. during those three pandemics were, respectively, 106 million, 180 million and 205 million. Today we are a nation of 330 million people.) A high death count, but one lower than that suggested by Imperial College London’s model and others, is also in their interest, as it helps justify their decision to shutter the economy. The CDC now allows coroners to list COVID-19 as a “probable or presumed” cause of death, even if the patient had never been tested. It will only be when antibody testing becomes ubiquitous that we will learn how widespread COVID-19 has been and whether a herd immunity has developed.

We cannot and should not ignore the role played by China. They kept the virus, its characteristics and its origins, under wraps for too long. They were devious, whether intentionally or not. For example, on January 23 they banned flights within China from Wuhan, but not flights from Wuhan to other parts of the world, including Europe and the U.S. We cannot forget that the WHO and the CDC downplayed the transmission rates of the virus (even commenting in January that it was not transmissible from human to human), when China had to have known how contagious it was, and so should have the WHO. What we know now is that the virus is highly contagious. We know it came from Wuhan, most likely from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Chinese scientist Shi Zhengli has for fifteen years warned that bats she works with at the Institute, harbor coronaviruses, which pose serious risks to humans. As speculation has mounted that she may have been the source of the pandemic, she denies any culpability, reminding one of Hamlet’s Queen Gertrude: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.” The New York Times reported on April 4 that 390,000 people traveled from China to the U.S. during the month before President Trump placed a ban on travel from China – a period when China knew of its deadly consequences. We also know that most Chinese college students in the U.S. (about 400,000) would have returned to their campuses after the Christmas holidays. Should we believe that no one coming from China in December and January carried the virus to the U.S.?

How widespread is the virus? No one knows. Stanford researchers have tested 3,000 residents in Santa Clara County, about 1.5% of the population, for coronavirus antibodies. The results suggest that between 2.5% and 4.2% of people had contacted COVID-19, a population 50 to 85 times greater than the number of cases reported. Similar tests in San Miguel County, Colorado suggest that one to two percent of the County had been infected and perhaps ten times carry the virus. The differences between the two counties may reflect demographics – Santa Clara has two million residents and includes San Jose and Palo Alto, while San Miguel County has a population of 8,191, extending west from Telluride to Slick Rock. Taken together, both tests suggest that the total infected population of the U.S. is likely ten to eighty times official numbers. That also would be the inference of a report from the Los Alamos National Laboratory that concluded an infected person passes the virus to 5.7 people – twice what the WHO said in February. More serological tests are needed, but the data suggests a herd immunity exists. As well, both tests indicate the morbidity rate is lower than claimed.

The United States, because of its wealth and success, has become complacent. We have seen complacency in markets near peaks, when hope rules and skepticism dissipates; we have seen it in athletic teams, when a winning streak feels it can go on forever; we have seen it in businesses. We have seen it in universities. We see that complacency today in politics where social justice rides above the rule of law, and where over a million and a half people in California voted for an avowed socialist; and we see it in activists who divert water from farmers in California’s Central Valley to protect the Delta smelt. Even in the $2.2 trillion aid package to help people and businesses hurt by COVID-19, Congress earmarked $25 million to the CDC to study gun violence. Nevertheless, this coronavirus has made people realize that viruses are not political, that they recognize no borders, nor do they care for social or economic status. Stay-at-home rules have made us more aware of the importance of things we miss – family, friends, church, weddings, anniversaries, graduations and, yes, funerals.

Yet, what strikes one most forcibly about this pandemic is not its severity – the three other pandemics mentioned above infected and killed more people – but the unquestioning compliance with rules to “shelter-in-place,” a manifestation of complacency toward liberty. It has been the willingness of the people to accept, without doubt, question or protest, measures that have been harmful to their pocketbooks and, more important, to their freedom. This is not to dismiss the seriousness of the coronavirus, especially for the vulnerable, but we can never forget that totalitarian regimes begin with disallowing dissension and controlling thought. We have grown soft. Our wealth has moved us to substitute comfort for freedom – universal healthcare, education for all and a guaranteed income, at the expense of individual independence. However, a change is underway. After almost six weeks of shutdowns there have been protests in at least twenty states: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Washington. There are sure to be others. These are the people most harmed from the economic shutdown. “Liberate Michigan,” said President Trump in a tweet last week, providing encouragement for those who must to return to work but dismaying for elitists, like the editor of our local paper.

The concern of an existential threat, and the balance that must be found between safety and freedom, was a worry for Alexander Hamilton. In Federalist 8, he wrote: “Safety from external danger is the most powerful director of national conduct. Even the ardent love of liberty will, after a time, give way to its dictates.” Hamilton’s concern was war; today, we cannot allow a desire for safety be reason to surrender freedom. Think of Londoners during the Blitz.   

"What is a Person to Believe?"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“What is a Person to Believe”

April 17, 2020

“A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.”

David Hume (1711-1776)

Scottish philosopher, historian

An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, 1748

We are told we live in an era of science. Neil deGrasse Tyson wrote, “the good thing about science is that it’s true, whether or not you believe in it.” But is that really so? Does not science change as new evidence is gathered? Statisticians use models to justify their findings. Yet models are only as good as their inputs. The epidemiologists’ models we have seen regarding COVID-19 have changed markedly over the past few weeks. In mid-March, Imperial College in London predicted 2.2 million deaths in the U.S., with no mitigation. By the first of April, modelers at Oxford saw that number drop to a range of 100,000 to 240,000, with some mitigation. Now the estimate is 60,000. A University of Virginia model shows COVID-19 will peak this summer, while Health Metrics Evaluation at the University of Washington suggests the virus will “peter out” in May. Models make assumptions about, among other factors, human behavior, the measurement of which is an art? What is a person to believe?

If we are to base our beliefs about COVID-19 on the basis of “evidence,” it is unsurprising that confusion abounds. We presume, with strong reason, that it came from the city of Wuhan in Hubei Province, China, but whether from a live bat sold for human consumption at a wet market or the Wuhan Center for Disease Control has never been made clear. We are told coronavirus is highly contagious. Ten days ago, the Los Alamos National Laboratory published an article in which they claimed that the transmission rate for COVID-19 is between 4.7 and 6.6. For comparison purposes, the seasonal flu, the transmission rate is 1.3. (The transmission rate is also referred to as the regeneration rate, or the R0.) At the midpoint, 5.7, over ten rounds, one person could infect 36 million people. The chief epidemiologist at the Chinese Centers for Disease Control in Beijing puts the transmission rate at between 1.0 and 5.0. At the midpoint of 2.5, and after ten rounds, one individual could infect 9,538 people.  Which are we to believe?

Mortality rates are equally confusing. Is the rate calculated only for confirmed cases, or do deaths recorded include those with underlying conditions from which recovery was not probable?? Recently, some deaths attributed to COVID-19 include those who were suspected of having COVID-19, but on whom no tests were made. Is that fair? What about obesity, diabetes and lung disease. Should the asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic be included in the denominator? And what about perspective? In 2018, 7,779 people died every day in the United States. That would suggest that since the first two deaths in the U.S. from COVID-19 on February 26, more than 388,000 Americans have died from other causes. As of April 15, 30,844 Americans have died from COVID-19, (a number that includes 4,059 “probable” deaths in New York City). – a tragedy, but one that needs be kept in perspective. At the end of March, mortality rates from COVID-19 in the U.S. were estimated at 3.4 percent. Today, with millions more having been tested, that number is around 0.3 percent. Will that number continue to decrease as more tests are performed, or will a relaxation of lockdowns and social distancing, necessary for re-opening the economy, cause that number to rise?

Has the virus spread more widely than is known or acknowledged? Wuhan is China’s sixth largest city with a population of 11.1 million people. It has the largest student body population of any city in the world, which means that thousands of U.S. students were in Wuhan through the end of 2019, a month to six weeks after the virus was established. As well. In the 2017-2018 academic year, 360,000 Chinese students were enrolled in U.S. universities. Presumably, the numbers were similar for the 2019-2020 academic year. Most of those students would have returned to their U.S. college campuses following the Christmas holidays. Yet, the first person in the U.S. to be diagnosed with the novel coronavirus, 2-nCoV019, was a thirty-five-year old man, with “underlying health issues,” on January 19. He had returned to Washington State after visiting family in Wuhan. He claimed that when in Wuhan he had had no contact with anyone who was ill. After eight days in the hospital, he was asymptomatic and discharged. But are we to believe, with 3,000 to 4,000 people arriving in the U.S. every day from China through the end of January, that no one else had contacted this novel, contagious virus before then? Is it not possible that there are thousands, if not millions, in the U.S. who are asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic and have developed immunity?

And what about China, the source of this contagion? Hubei Province includes 58.5 million people. As a stand-alone country, it would rank as the 26^th largest in the world, just behind Italy and just ahead of Spain. For all of its economic success over the past two or three decades, China remains a Communist dictatorship. Two hundred million surveillance cameras keep watch over its 1.4 billion people. The Chinese Communist Party, at 90.5 million members, may be the second largest political party in the world, but the other 93% of the population lack basic rights and opportunities. Despite the enormous wealth of Chinese Communist leaders, China is a poor country. Household incomes in urban areas average about $6,000 a year. One point five million Muslim Uighurs are being held in 1,000 re-education camps in Xinjiang Province, in China’s northwest. This is the country that allowed the novel coronavirus to spread around the world for two months, with tens of thousands of people flying into and out of Hubei Province, before notifying the rest of world. Worse, the WHO (World Health Organization) was their willing partner. Should we believe them now, as they claim to want to help stop the spread of the virus they started?

Besides Chinese disinformation and the natural political exaggerations in an election year, part of the confusion lies in the fact that COVID-19 is a novel virus, which means it is a new strain never before seen in humans, so doctors and scientists had to learn on the go. Part of the problem is ours, for when we heard from those who make evidenced-based decisions we believed their predictions were accurate. Like sheep, we accepted the most extreme of the forecasted death rates, which resulted in an economic shutdown, the proportions of which have not been seen in at least eighty-seven years. We were led away, without debate, from the concept of a “herd” immunity, which might have ended the blight without risking the economy. In years to come, when historians review the virus and the reaction, will they say we acted wisely, or will the judgment be we reacted with a “herd” mentality, and that when attacked we assumed the hedge hog’s defense. It goes without saying that the aged and the health-vulnerable need protection, but like lemmings, have we run off the proverbial economic cliff? What is a person to believe?

Last evening at the President daily press conference with the coronavirus task force, Dr. Deborah Birx laid out guidelines for re-opening the country in three phases. These are guidelines – not directives – and the timing is left to the states. They will be using CDC’s influenza-like maps that they have for every county and city. The guidelines appear sensible, so one would expect that governors will likely adopt them. Before a state can enter phase one, it must show a downward trajectory for fourteen days of those infected. The guidelines include continuation of good hygiene, the wearing of masks when in public and staying home when sick. Employers must ensure that social distancing is maintained, counters and public areas disinfected regularly, employees’ temperatures are taken daily, and non-essential travel is prohibited. Phase two will allow non-essential travel to resume and some schools and camps to open. In phase three the vulnerable should be allowed back into public places. Throughout all phases, good hygiene and common sense should rule. How long each phase would last would be up to the individual governors. Nevertheless, this was a moment of sunshine at a bleak time, and I hope does not betray our belief.

"Risks and COVID-19"

Sydney M. Williams

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Thought of the Day

“Risks and COVID-19”

April 11, 2020

“There is freedom waiting for you.

On the breezes of the sky.

And you ask. What if I fall?

Oh, but my darling,

What if you fly?”

                                                                                    Erin Henson (1981-)

                                                                                    Artist, Designer, Poet

Most decisions we make involve some measure of risk. Generally, the consideration is fleeting. Do I take the stairs and risk falling, or the elevator and risk it breaking down? At times, the choice is more absolute: Do I take the double-black diamond with moguls, or do I go around on the bunny trail? Sometimes the odds are important: Is my need to cross the street against traffic so great that the attempt should be made despite oncoming traffic? Risk is ubiquitous. It is embedded in the friends we make, where we go to college, what job we take and in our choice of a marriage partner – a risk my wife and I took fifty-six years ago today. A wise friend used to say that he was never upset with mistakes he had made but was troubled by risks he never took. Risks vary depending on what we do. To a soldier in combat, risks have different consequences than the ones we encounter daily. In his 1916 collection of poems, Mountain Interval, Robert Frost included “The Road Not Taken.” At a fork in the road a traveler pauses, knowing he cannot walk down both paths, so chooses “the one less traveled by…”  The reader never knows whether the choice was a good one or not, only that it “has made all the difference.” As well, progress is impossible without risk. A baserunner cannot steal second without taking his foot off first. Neither can we avoid risk. “Security,” as Helen Keller once wrote, “is mostly a superstition.”

Risk is defined as the interaction with uncertainty, a measure of the probability of danger or loss, against safety or profit. In our daily lives, we try to mitigate risk. We are encouraged to look before we leap. Insurance companies employ actuaries to assess risk and calculate premiums. Investors use algorithms to quantify the risk of loss against the potential for gain. While these calculations are never perfect, they are Darwinian in that those who are best at measuring risk tend to be the most successful, what Joseph Schumpeter termed creative destruction in industries as they adapt to change.

Politicians employ risk to further agendas: we are told we will be overrun by illegal immigrants if we do not shut our borders; we are frightened into believing that anthropomorphic warming will destroy the planet, and that an ever-expanding population will lead to mass starvation. Now we have the health risk of COVID-19 that was first downplayed by professionals, the media and politicians, but which now dominates the news. As well, COVID-19 has created enormous economic risks.  

There is little question that COVID-19 is dangerous, especially for the elderly and those that have under-lying medical conditions, like asthma, lung diseases, heart conditions, diabetes, liver or chronic kidney disease. Given the game of blame, as to who missed the seriousness of the virus, it may be of value to review some of what was said and done about COVID-19, from when it first made its appearance – a timeline, if you will, but a list that does not pretend to be exhaustive; but it is indicative.

November 17, 2019 – On March 14, 2020, Jeanna Bryner, Editor-in-Chief of Life Science, quoting the South Morning China Post, reported that a “55-year-old individual from Hubei Province may have been the first person to have contacted COVID-19…That case dates back to November 17, 2019….That’s more than a month earlier than doctors noted cases in Wuhan, China, which is in Hubei Province.”

December 31, 2019 – The New York Times reported on April 7, 2020 that on December 31, 2019: “The Chinese government confirmed that health authorities were treating dozens of cases.”

January 14, 2020 – The World Health Organization (WHO) said: “Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission.”[1]

January 17, 2020 – The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) stated that, “based on current information, the risk from 2019-nCoV to the American public is currently deemed to be low.” The CDC and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced that American citizens returning from travel-restricted countries were being rerouted to specific airports where they would be screened and isolated.

January 20, 2020 – Japan, South Korea and Thailand reported their first cases of the novel coronavirus.

January 21-24, 2020 – World Economic Forum in Davos – attended by 3000 individuals from 117 countries, including 53 heads of state. China sent a large delegation, though Xi Jinping did not attend.  

January 21, 2020 – The first case of coronavirus in the United States was reported of a man who had traveled from Wuhan, China.

January 22, 2020 – President Trump, in response to a question regarding COVD-19: “We have it totally under control; it is one person, coming in from China.”  On that same day, Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR), a hawk on China, sent a letter to Alexander Azar, Secretary of Health and Human (HHS), encouraging the Administration to consider banning travel between China and the U.S.

January 24, 2020 – The CDC confirms the second U.S. case of coronavirus, adding, “based on what we know right now, the immediate risk to Americans remains low.”

January 28, 2020 – The WHO, following a meeting between WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and Chinese President Xi Jinping, issued a release: “The WHO delegation highly appreciated the actions China has implemented in response to the outbreak, its speed in identifying the virus and openness in sharing information with WHO and other countries.”

January 29, 2020 – According to an April 5th article in the New York Times by Maggie Haberman, Peter Navarro, President Trump’s trade advisor, warned the White House on January 29th that coronavirus could “cost the Country trillions of dollars and put millions of Americans at risk of illness or death.”

January 30, 2020 – The WHO declared a global health emergency of international concern. The CDC confirmed publicly for the first time the person-to-person spread of coronavirus. That same day President Trump created the White House Coronavirus Task Force to coordinate all efforts, with HHS Secretary Alexander Azar as chair.

January 31, 2020 – President Trump declared coronavirus a U.S. public health emergency and issued a ban on travel between the United States and China. On that same day, Joe Biden criticized the President for the travel ban: “This is no time for Donald Trump’s record of hysteria and xenophobia.”

February 4, 2020 – The White House directed the FDA (The U.S. Food and Drug Administration) to step up coronavirus diagnostic testing procedures.

February 5, 2020 – The CDC issued a statement: “While we continue to believe the immediate risk of 2019nCoV exposure to the general public is low, CDC is undertaking measures to help keep that risk low.”

February 7, 2020 – New York City Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot told a TV interviewer, “I want to be clear, this is about a virus, not a group of people. There is no excuse for anyone to discriminate or stigmatize people of Asian heritage. We are here today to urge all New Yorkers to continue to live their lives as usual.”

February 10, 2020 – New York’s Mayor Bill de Blasio was interviewed on MSNBC: “If you are under 50 and you’re healthy, which is most New Yorkers, there’s very little threat here. This disease, even if you were to get it, basically acts like a common cold or flu. And transmission is not that easy.”

                  February 18, 2020 – The CDC reaffirmed, “The risk to Americans from coronavirus is low.”

February 20, 2020 – The White House raised travel warnings to their highest level for Japan and South Korea.

February 24, 2020 – Nancy Pelosi toured San Francisco’s Chinatown, urging people to come along, mingle and shake hands with residents.

            February 26, 2020 – The first case of suspected local transmission in the United States was announced by the CDC. On that same day, President Trump replaced Mr. Azar as head of the corona task force with Vice President Michael Pence.

            February 27, 2020 – Vice President Pence named Dr. Deborah Birx to serve as the White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator.

            February 29, 2020 – The first death in the U.S. from coronavirus was recorded in the U.S. On the same day, President Trump halted travel to and from Iran.

            March 11, 2020 – The WHO declared coronavirus a worldwide pandemic.

            March 12, 2020 – President Trump imposed travel restrictions with Europe.

            March 13, 2020 – President Trump declared coronavirus a national emergency.

            March 14, 2020 – The White House extended travel bans to the United Kingdom.

All the incidents mentioned above reflect risks that were either political, reputational or both. People on both sides of the aisle can find the fodder to satisfy claims of neglect or worse. But should that be our pursuit as we face the twin crises of a pandemic and a collapsed economy? As someone once said (or should have if they did not), “democracy is a slow process of stumbling to the right decision, instead of going straight forward to the wrong one.” Unlike dictatorships, democracies move slowly, as they listen to multiple voices and encourage debate. Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, after Pearl Harbor, is alleged to have said: “I fear we have awakened a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve.” They had. Was the President late in declaring a health emergency, or did the fault lie with the WHO and the CDC who downplayed its seriousness? Should Democrats have been pursuing a feckless impeachment when the coronavirus was invading our shores? Early on, with the exception of Senator Tom Cotton and Secretary Alexander Azar no one in Washington appeared to take seriously what became a pandemic. Why? Was it because of a deceitful China or a compromised WHO? Was it because Washington and the media were otherwise engaged? In a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Holman Jenkins concluded: “Many things are worth doing; many risks are worth taking, and many are worth avoiding. It would be great to have more clear thinking about which is which in our current crisis.”  But that is the problem with forecasts. We deal with things as they are. “The future,” as the song goes, “is not ours to see.” At the moment the focus should be on helping the sick, finding cures and righting the economy. There will come a time to disinter the past and place blame where it belongs: who underplayed and who overplayed the risks of COVID-19?

With the benefit of hindsight, it is easy to point out missed signs, like the concern of Senator Cotton on January 22 or the warnings from Secretary Azar a week later. But it wasn’t until January 30 that the WHO and the CDC elevated coronavirus to a health emergency of international concern. The next day, the President declared COVID-19 a U.S. public health emergency and banned flights from China. So, should he have listened to two men, accomplished in their fields but neither a doctor, or should he have heeded the scientists and doctors at the CDC and the WHO? Keep in mind, the President had to navigate the ship of state through the Charybdis of a public panic and the Scylla of ignoring an unknown health threat. He chose a middle course. Given what we now know about the failure of a compromised WHO and a depleted Strategic National Stockpile of drugs and medical equipment, it appears, at least to me, that he chose well. But risks continue to propagate. The United States has lost 10% of its workforce in three weeks, a rate of decline faster than during the Great Depression. The President now faces a challenge – how to restart a twenty-two trillion-dollar economy, without reigniting the deadly virus.

It has been three months since coronavirus struck our nation. As a Country, we have rallied. It appears that social distancing, self-isolation and commonsense hygiene are working, and that the worse may soon be over – that the light at the end of the tunnel may not be a freight train barreling toward us, but the light of resurrection, appropriate in this time of Passover and Easter. But there remain risks our leaders must take – How to restart this economy from the somnolence of a six-to-eight-week shutdown? How to pay back the two to four trillion dollars borrowed to save businesses and jobs? This will require more choices, decisions (and risks) for the politicians who lead. We are in untraveled territory. COVID-19 has not been eviscerated. Re-starting the economic engine will not be easy. Money is not free, and we all know it is the private sector that generates the income the public sector spends. Voters in November will elect the individual they believe best suited to lead us toward a healthy, economic revival.    

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[1] Dates, not otherwise identified, come from a March 31, 2020 report by Cleta Mitchell in The Federalist. She is a partner in the Washington, D.C. law office of Foley and Lardner