Old folks; Colored folks
The Covid 19 virus has ravaged the nation’s elderly population, especially those in nursing homes, and people of color, particularly those residing in lower income communities.
Some U.S. Senators, Congressmen, governors (mostly in the so-called “red” states), local officials, and a host of Looney-bin pundits taking a break from the Tiger King have peddled the notion that the economy is more important than human life.
The notion that rescuing the nation’s faltering economy is more important than saving lives from the Covid pandemic presupposes that the economy is fueled by a younger, more vigorous generation,
This nation, and its free market economy, exists because of the wisdom, experience, and human decency of the older generation.
Youth unchecked by wisdom is as useless as “tits on a boar hog,” as my grandpa use to say.
Youth, standing on its own two legs, guided by its own developing instincts, tends to be foolish, and too often dangerous. Age, and the maturity it brings to the table, is as essential to both a safe society and a thriving economy, as tires are to a motor vehicle.
Youth may be the GPS in an F-150 but it is age that is the motor of the truck.
I guarantee one thing: that truck is not going anywhere without a motor.
And while I may be overreaching here, I have a pet theory about the increasing volume of calls to “reopen the economy” after it became known through media reports that people of color represent a disproportionate number of the Covid deaths, especially since most of the folks making these calls are white and generally come from the politically conservative community.
Roughly, 80 percent of the people who contract the Covid virus survive it relatively unscathed while the remaining 20 percent suffer more serious medical consequences, particularly if they are aged 80 or older and are people of color.
There are a significant number of people who really don’t care of these folks die for whatever reason—some of them recently gathered en masse at a Michigan rally where they demanded that the governor reopen the economy while waving their Nazi and Confederate flags, shaking hands, and slapping each other on the back.
Granted, most of the people issuing “reopen the economy” calls do not fall into this hate-driven class of idiots, but they are driven by this draconian ideology: the loss of 50,000 or 100,000 or one million lives is okay so long as the local bar and Nascar race track remain open.
These “reopen the economy” folks believe pretty much what conservative talk show host Bill O’Reilly recently expressed—that people succumbing to the Covid virus are on their last leg in life so they are really expendable in order for the rest of society to see what the Patriots can do without Tom Brady.
It comes down to this: money over human lives. That has always been the driving force of capitalism. It’s always been loosely described as “profit before people.”
Decent people believe, and thank God for them, that both the economy and lives can be saved at the same time; that people in this country can have their Popeye chicken sandwiches without stacking the bodies of nursing home patients in a closet.
This nation has both a moral and social obligation to take care of the most vulnerable among us while simultaneously preserving the political necessity to get the economy reopened.
And if this nation lacks the courage to accept these moral and social obligations, then those hate-driven folks waving the Nazi and Confederate flags will soon own this nation.