Words are fun. I especially like the ones that describe emotion or a state of mind. With COVID 19 I have been put to the test. There are so many conflicting points of view and definitions, there are times when I really wonder where the hell I am at. 

Over the years I have loved and actually made a living out of solving problems or just figuring out different ways to do things. It is not necessarily contrarian but just another set of eyes. Not prescience but just not willing to accept a certain solution as the only one. I have met my match this time in even trying to define the problem before solving it.

At first glance, it is a disease and we have to look to medicine to cure it. As a country and a business we have spent a lot of money trying to eradicate this or that malady. Right now we have the world’s greatest scientific minds racing for the cure. I wish it was a more cooperative venture but for the moment I have given up tilting at windmills. Right on cue the Chinese are hacking into our research to see if they can beat everyone to the punch. Yikes!

While waiting for panacea we need assurances. Where else would one go but to the  federal government? Kids, unfortunately this has been a dismal failure. Stockpiles, disaster plans, supply chains, even the lack of a synchronous response, all point to chaos and infighting. It makes you wonder what all these agencies are doing? First we need ventilators, then we don’t. This drug works. No this one does. Field hospitals and mercy ships go wanting for customers. No one is singing out of the same hymnal. 

Let’s turn to Congress. World War II, 9/11 and even the financial meltdown got everyone on the same page. Not this time. Each side has a shopping list and an agenda for the next two or three trillion. Chastise the other side as being un American because in our perfect storm this is an election year. I don’t know who I abhor more, Pelosi or Uncle Mitch in front of the microphone. His Hairness? Don’t go there. 

Failing all else, we may have to just rely on ourselves. We have a newly retired emergency room doc here in LaLa Land, who just got back from several weeks of volunteering his time at Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. The number of people who just “Do It” is astounding. Some have contracted the disease and died. Something about no greater love. Our hats are off to them in spades. 

But what about you and me? It has been shown that social distancing and masks work. I don’t really want to wear my bandana to Publix but I do it out of courtesy for someone’s else’s fear. You son of  bitch ,TTG ! You are taking away my rights as an American. If I want to stand wall to wall with people at a bar or on a beach I am going to do so. It is my legacy. The other side wants to lock down forever. Is there a happy medium we can all agree on? Sorry, poor choice of words. 

I fear we are painting with broad brushes. As of press time we have 90,000 deaths due to COVID. 39,000 were in two states, New York and New Jersey. Nationwide 80% of the deaths have occurred in patients over 65. A large majority have been in nursing homes. For just a minute imagine if we just locked down the populace by age. Sure younger people are going to get it but they will recover. We old farts make up 15% of the population. Has anyone asked why we have to sequester the other 85% ? Am I willing to do it? Yes for the sake of my kids and grandkids. I won’t like it but I will do it. Would you?

The lockdown has instilled fear in every part of our society as buyers of stuff. People swoon at the idea of going to the mall again but are reticent. Cars, boats and other toys are languishing on lots and on shelves. Depreciation is almost as bad as corrosion. Is it just me or does the fact that 75% of our economy is based around consumables finally hit home? 

The problem as I see it is twofold. First we have to find a vaccine or at least therapeutic drugs to help us get through it. Let’s hope we are on it. Secondly we have to reinvent ourselves from top to bottom. Just take government, education and infrastructure to start with. The latter is both the physical highways, airports etc and the nation supply lines. It is a total absurdity and embarrassing that livestock are being euthanized and crops left to rot in the field while food banks go wanting. It is almost Orwellian. 

We are smug in our world. I know there is poverty but a vast majority of us are doing okay. Most of the jobs lost will come back. We preen ourselves in the mirror and say we will come back better than ever. That might be right depending on your version of contentment. I would rather keep looking and searching. We have problems that are systemic and need more than a vaccine. I will continue to be flummoxed and addled amidst the enigma that has me in a kerfuffle.It is just the way I am 

As always 

Ted The Great 

Factoids:

3.7 million gallons of milk daily are washed down the drain every day. Farmers in Washington state have a surplus of one BILLION potatoes.

There are 700,000 pigs across the nation that cannot be processed each week and must be humanely euthanized.

Congress has authorized roughly $3 trillion in coronavirus relief in four separate measures over the last two months. The new $3 trillion bill would greatly increase monies to states and municipalities. 

A  study by SUNY’s Rockefeller Institute found that over four years from 2015 to 2018, New York taxpayers paid $116 billion more in federal taxes than the state received in federal funding. During the same period, Kentucky received $148 billion in federal funds more than Kentuckians paid in federal taxes.  Imagine that! 

Over 100,000 volunteer medical workers have gone to New York. Many of them have been stymied in their efforts to go by bureaucracy or lack thereof. One nurse in North Carolina want to donate her time. No one would call her back. She called a hospital and they said she would have to go through their recruitment agency. She wanted to do it for free but they pay her $3800 per week…..which of course New York State taxes her on.  I can’t make this stuff up.