Monday, March 16, 2020

In the Good Old Hunkertime

Before the CNN Go! app which streamed the Democratic debate got up and went, I managed to watch about half of last night's show. Either Joe Biden was fed massive doses of a secret stimulant drug before airtime, or what we saw was a cyborg standing in for Joe Biden. He utterly failed to meet expectations for one of his epic freeze-ups or terminal meltdowns. Pick your metaphor. Because  Biden actually sounded more coherent than he has in many years.

He sounded especially and chillingly cogent when he echoed the neoliberal talking point that Medicare For All is not the miracle drug we need to tackle the coronavirus pandemic. Look at Italy, he scoffed. They have guaranteed care and people are still dying. What we need is a surge, folks, as in the military. Never mind that the military enjoys its own socialistic health care delivery system.

As far as Bernie was concerned, what a thrill that not once did he utter the dreaded words "Joe is a good friend of mine" during the debate. Although Joe "won" the night simply by sounding minimally and shockingly coherent, Bernie won the night by expressing more empathy for suffering people than Biden has ever been capable of in the whole last half century of his right-wing political career.

With massive lock-downs being ordered by the hour and state primaries being cancelled, it is even becoming doubtful that Biden will have the requisite number of delegates to win the nomination in the traditional way. The other week, I was half-joking when I speculated that the convention will be cancelled and that a small group of elite Democratic officials will nominate Biden or another corporate tool aboard billionaire megadonor Dave Geffen's deep-cleaned jumbo luxury yacht.

And that brings up the general election itself. Although Donald Trump does not have it within his emergency powers to call it off, states themselves could postpone the election if the virus is still raging. By the time November comes around, we may have full-fledged anarchy, or rule by military junta (Biden's "surge") or at best, rule by individual mayors, governors and local councils.

The "future" as a concept has been turned right on its ear. So has the all-American religion of consumerism.

Either wealth begins to be immediately redistributed to ordinary people in the form of a permanent and universal guaranteed income, or ordinary people will begin taking matters into their own hands if they don't first begin succumbing to starvation, chronic maladies, violence, exposure and despair in such record numbers that they will swamp the COVID-19 morbidity and mortality rates.

I hate to clue Uncle Joe in, but we're in the middle of a revolution right now, whether he likes it or not. He can take a return to the glorious Obama years and shove it.

13 comments:

  1. Timid Bernie was disappointingly true to form, proving you really can't teach an old dog new tricks. He politely attempted to call out Biden over repeated denials and lies about Social Security but only by referring to YouTube in general.

    I wish he had just called him a lying, dog-face pony soldier and laughed.

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  2. I guess the big news last night was Biden announcing he would name a woman as VP.

    Was it my imagination or did I hear a fat lady singing at the end? She sounded jarringly out of tune, then cackled.

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  3. voice-in-wildernessMarch 16, 2020 at 12:44 PM

    Just relax. It is Game Over even though that has not flashed up on our screens. Trump is not leaving office after the November election, no matter who his opponent is, no matter what the vote is. Trump will adjust the reason to the circumstances of the moment. Terrorism? Disease? Democratic cheating? Fairness(he's very big on that as applied to himself)? All of the above?

    I will still vote as a formality, perhaps the last time in my life I'll be allowed to do so! (smile)

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  4. OMG! I must have Covid19-induced DELIRIUM! I'm thinking we should demand the general election be held immediately and I'm ready to campaign for a Bidden/Clinton or Clinton/Biden ticket.

    Hillary is definitely ready to answer that damned 3am phone call that's been ringing off the hook for a month which Trump refuses to answer. And Joe? Well, he can just smile and make everyone feel good - the Healer in Chief.

    Here's their campaign slogan: THEY'VE GOT THIS!
    (or rather SHE'S GOT THIS!)

    Could there ever be a more experienced team to hit the ground running for this pandemic and economic meltdown? It's a winning team. Let's get it over with.

    I'm clearly slipping away, so please wake me up from my coma when things get back to normal.

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  5. Annie, the Good Book says "The meek shall inherit the earth." I assume that includes the White House. In that case, Bernie's been on the right path for 2016 and 2020.

    Yeah, right. As if the outcome of the Duopoly's quadrennial show might provide relief from the big problems afflicting the USA and every other corner of the globe. The center of American power and action is tucked elsewhere and its minions have been very busy stirring the pot recently.

    Sorry, OT the rest of the way down the page.

    Octogenarians don't go easy on long trips. I didn't want to go on this March "vacation," but family obligations prevailed. Or was it plain uxoriousness? As soon as we arrived, we realized we had to kiss off the money spent for a month of lodging and the (uninsured) economy return flight. We never completed our mission of visiting family, but thankfully are hunkering back at home in self-imposed quarantine away from crowds and tight Boeings. Now back to the news.

    IF you come around to believing the latest conspiracy theory, i.e., that the new corona virus is not a naturally-evolved viral mutant that just happened to pop up in Wuhan but was made in a sophisticated lab then planted abroad as a bio-weapon, THEN it follows that we are now in World War III. Yes: WWIII. The real leaders the big powers involved certainly are aware of the deadly game going on and they will react with countermeasures in kind, because that's the way in war. This time no TNT or mushroom clouds followed by the theatre of an FDR asking Congress for a formal declaration of war with fighting words like "day of infamy." WWIII is already on.

    I usually don't dig conspiracy theories. But here's the most convincing case I've read for the conspiracy theory that says covid-19 is a Made-in-the-USA chimera placed in Wuhan by a US hand. It's a detailed comment but clear and convincing.

    OldMicrobiologist on March 12, 2020 · at 3:13 pm EST/EDT
    https://thesaker.is/continuation-of-the-kinda-open-thread/

    To summarize, a scientist in the know recalls there was a routine multi-nation competition of military athletes in Wuhan before the virus showed up in November 2019. The US team went there not with their usual olympics-ready cast, which always does well, but with an embarrassingly incompetent crew of athletes. Who were these dudes?

    A most troubling element of the conspiracy theory is that the virus itself had to have been spliced to include strange strands of material that could only have been added in a fancy government lab.

    The rest of the story is a matter of an expert insider (retired) connecting dots. If what he describes is so, the planting of the virus was the stealth beginning of WWIII.

    This time no "Battle of the Frontiers," which kicked off WWI; no invasion of Poland and no dramatic attack on Pearl Harbor to line up sides for WWII. No, WWIII started quietly a few months ago as a biological attack, but as explosive and lethal as anything in the past.

    We are now living through the early days of the war. Not bad so far. But China, I've read, buys in to this conspiracy theory––whether or not it's true. There will be hell to pay. Expect a counterattack on top of all the other inconveniences you may now be enduring. And, rest assured, China is skilled in all forms of warfare, whether the duel is with pistols, nukes or microbes.

    I would greatly appreciate anyone here reading the link provided above (among other sources available) and then un-convincing me that a stealth team connected to the US planted this fiendish virus in China in order to discredit its government and cripple its economy. Why? So the US petro dollar should remain dominant. (No irony in this request.)

    While billions of us will be struggling to survive our elite's WWIII, global warming will be lapping slowly and steadily up the beaches of every continent, ultimately to wash over what little remains of the long day ahead.

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  6. I watched the debate debacle last night online.
    While Biden appeared pumped up, I thought Sanders blew it miserably.

    Listen to this for some good specific analysis, especially pointing out Biden’s blatant lies.
    Incredibly, however, in speculating about which woman would be Biden’s VP, Hillary Clinton was not mentioned.

    It evokes Minnesota’s unofficial state motto: "Things could be worse."
    And of course the unstated corollary notes that they probably will be.


    Deconstructed with Mehdi Hasan —
    Bernie Versus Biden: Who Won the Debate?
    Mehdi Hasan and Ryan Grim break down Sunday night’s one-on-one encounter between Joe Biden and Bernie.
    https://theintercept.com/2020/03/16/bernie-versus-biden-who-won-the-debate/
    March 16 2020

    Recorded before that, note this:

    RUMBLE with MICHAEL MOORE - Ep. 52: O Government, Where Art Thou? (feat. Dr. Abdul El-Sayed)
    https://www.podbean.com/media/share/dir-5eh8v-850ab79?utm_campaign=w_share_ep&utm_medium=dlink&utm_source=w_share
    2020-03-15
    In a modern, functioning, democratic society, how should a public health crisis be handled? And what would America's response to the coronavirus pandemic look like if we had a universal healthcare system such as Medicare For All? Michael discusses this with Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a physician and epidemiologist and the former Health Commissioner in the City of Detroit. El-Sayed ran for Governor of Michigan campaigning on universal healthcare. His forthcoming book is titled, "Healing Politics: A Doctor's Journey Into the Heart of Our Political Epidemic."

    Lead in at ~24 minutes >>—> an excellent description of the USA's insurance & pharmaceutical industry system vs. single-payer (beginning at 29 minutes).


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  7. Addendum: In addition to the OldMicrobiologist's initial comment, scroll down to his replies to questioners immediately following.

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  8. As I was walking up the ramp out of the dock today, one of the young fishermen called out to me, “see you in a couple weeks!”

    “Are you going on vacation?”

    “No,” he smiled, “we’re on lockdown.”

    And he was right. At 12:01 am Tuesday, we will have to “shelter in place” until April 7. The fisherman would finally have some time with his wife and children, and he seemed thrilled. The fish will wait.

    My peer group of “oldladyfriends” in Berkeley shrugged. We can still go outside to hike in the hills, they said. If they try to shut us up at City Council, we’ll host our own remote Council meeting.

    We spent the day comparing news notes, buying equipment for and test-running a DIY portable shower for the unhoused encampment down the road from the dock, and, as is inevitable in this location, letting the sight of herons distract us from the rumor that Klobuchar will be Biden’s pick.

    The irony of this moment (one of many) is that despite the Chamber of Commerce goons insisting for the past two years that the undeserving “homeless” were a public health menace, it appears this novel coronavirus entered our golden state on the wings of the solidly housed middle class. Cruise ship enthusiasts and well-meaning graduate students disembarking at our ports and airports tracked it in like so much dog poop on the bottom of a pre-Chirac Parisian sneaker, and now it threatens to end us.

    And potentially to change the disastrous course of unrestrained capitalism, as one of the ladies pointed out.

    As we walked in the shadow of the University, an institution STILL at war with Peoples’ Park activists, it occurred to me that the novel coronavirus had probably been here for close to two months, but went (and continues to go) untested in an asymptomatic population of young students.

    The latest headline is that Bernie is staying in the race, which is no doubt driving Anita Dunn crazy. Let it. Did you know there is a green-headed heron that graces our wetlands? It’s quite shy, but I and a few of the ladyfriends have glimpsed it on occasion. It’s supposedly a rare sight, but for all the fancy plumage, it can’t match the magnificent flight of the brown pelicans.

    The birds: For three years in a row we were hit by devastating wildfires of different strengths. The smoke was terrible for us even as we sheltered inside. And for those outside? Our unhoused friends? Our bird and animal friends? It killed many of them, destroyed their homes, too.

    Today, the air was crisp and the pelicans dove into the green water with tremendous force for their dinner and our friends at the encampment down the road bickered and laughed over their own suppers.

    Shelter in place, we will.

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  9. Puzzled, that was most excellent.

    Below, the first stanza of a poem by Lynn Ungar (3 Nov 2020)

    Pandemic

    What if you thought of it
    as the Jews consider the Sabbath—
    the most sacred of times?
    Cease from travel.
    Cease from buying and selling.
    Give up, just for now,
    on trying to make the world
    different than it is.
    Sing. Pray. Touch only those
    to whom you commit your life.
    Center down.

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  10. Thank you, Jay. And thank you for the resonant poem. It is beautiful, and I really needed it.

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  11. Biden Is Still Lying About His Positions on Social Security Cuts, the Bankruptcy Bill, and More —
    https://theintercept.com/2020/03/17/biden-fact-check-social-security-bankruptcy/
    March 17, 2020 ~ by Akela Lacy

    Democrats Debate: Neoliberal ‘Pragmatists’ Vs. People Pushing for Systemic Change —
    https://therealnews.com/stories/democrats-debate-neoliberal-pragmatists-vs-people-pushing-for-systemic-change
    March 16, 2020
    "Pacifica’s Sonali Kolhatkar joins us to delve into what the divide means, how the power of the Sander’s movement can push change, and what lies ahead in the war against Trump."

    Intercepted podcast: Our world is in deep trouble.
    Naomi Klein and Jeremy Scahill Discuss Coronavirus, the Election, and Solidarity in the Midst of a Pandemic
    https://theintercept.com/2020/03/17/naomi-klein-and-jeremy-scahill-discuss-coronavirus-the-election-and-solidarity-in-the-midst-of-a-pandemic/
    March 17, 2020

    Coronavirus Capitalism — and How to Beat It
    https://theintercept.com/2020/03/16/coronavirus-capitalism/
    March 16, 2020 ~ by Naomi Klein

    To all today: Sláinte



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  12. Got a punchline –– What? Punch? Too strong? Sorry, Senator.

    Got an air kiss for Bernie in the next debate (source: Seiji Yamada, Counterpunch)

    "It's either Medicare for All or Coronavirus for All."

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  13. Nice one, Karen. So glad to hear someone raise the issue of the bizarre character of Biden's apparent and miraculous pep and coherence. Mainstream media stayed away from that like a downed power line. Still enjoying your posts after all these years. Still spot on.
    Cat
    at
    http://roadblues-kitty.blogspot.com

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