Sunday, March 22, 2020

“Which Side Are You On?”

     The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary. – H. L. Mencken

     I’ve already said it many times, most recently in this piece. Frightened people who believe they cannot defend themselves are the most easily subjugated of all. Subjugation – the fascistic arrogation of unbounded power over us that the Left seeks – would ultimately be far deadlier than the Chinese coronavirus (which I’m thinking of re-christening the Communist Chinese coronavirus). While many Americans realize this, many others have closed their eyes to the danger, their good sense overwhelmed by the media-powered panic over a disease that’s not even as dangerous as common influenza.

     It must cease. The panic must be countered. There’s excellent evidence that the Chi-Com Crud, while irritating and more communicable than we’d like, is easily defeated with American-quality medical care. Granted that seniors with other diseases are at some risk, the rest of us, given some ordinary precautions, are not. That makes the principal urgency of the day a swift return to business as usual.

     The alternative isn’t just subjugation; it includes impoverishment as well.


     This morning, Independent Sentinel presents a letter from a professor at Bard College. It’s a must-read piece, of which I’ll excerpt only the tiniest snippet:

     Fellow Americans,

     Look at the front page of the New York Times. It screams about depression and paralysis in the United States. It announces that the coronavirus recession is in full swing. It is a war, folks, a war on America. This war is not with some foreign power; it is not a war among Americans. It is a war that American elites wage on American people.

     Please, please read it all, I beseech you! The writer, Professor Gennady Shkliarevsky, knows whereof he speaks: his concentration is in Russian and Soviet history.

     The Soviets controlled their media in their time. Pravda and Izvestia could only publish what they were allowed to publish. Our media aren’t under such constraints; they’re merely serving the wishes of the Democrat Party, which is so avid for a return to federal hegemony that it will plunge the nation into poverty, if necessary, to get it.

     It’s time to ask them, in a place, a time, and a format which will compel them to answer candidly: “Which side are you on, boys?”


     By now my Gentle Readers have read about the exchange of fire between NBC’s Peter Alexander and President Trump. Trump was plainly angered by Alexander’s obvious agenda. That anger was expressed in his response to Alexander’s tendentious “question.” But of course the media and the NeverTrumpRump have proclaimed that “question” perfectly legitimate, deserving of an ordinary answer, while Trump’s reply was intemperate and evasive.

     For three years the media have attacked this president. They’ve denied him credit for his achievements and have laid every negative development they can think of or concoct at his doorstep. They’ve questioned his character, his self-command, his agenda, his marriage, and his preferences in cuisines. (Was any other president ever held up to ridicule for preferring his steak well done with ketchup?) Yet Trump has soldiered on through it all, in a performance in office that entitles him to the highest of praise.

     Certain Trump-versus-the-media events have taken on an iconic status. The antagonist featured in many of them is CNN’s detestable Jim Acosta. Consider the famous event that got Acosta ejected from a Trump press conference. Consider Acosta’s public dressing down by Kellyanne Conway. Consider Acosta’s relentless badgering of Sarah Sanders, the first White House press secretary ever to need Secret Service protection.

     Fascinatingly, those events are viewed in completely opposite ways by pro-Trump and anti-Trump persons...in other words, by American patriots and enablers of Left-wing fascism.

     At this point it should not be necessary to ask which side the media are on...yet too many Americans still believe what they read in the papers and see on TV news.


     There isn’t much more to be said about all this. The fear-mongering by the media over the Chi-Com Crud, when counterpoised to the objective evidence about the virus, makes it plain that the press has an agenda other than the well-being of the American people. The NeverTrumpers who defend them are complicit in their offenses against the body politic and equally deserve to be shunned. They cannot and must not be forcibly silenced – that would be un-American – but it is imperative that these open enemies of the most effective, pro-American administration since Calvin Coolidge get no more of our credulity.

     Similarly, the various governors and mayors who’ve arrogated authorities never delegated to them in any constitution or charter must be sharply rebuffed. For each of them to be dragged from his mansion, tarred, feathered, and run out of town on a rail would be fitting. While that’s unlikely, at the very least we can turn them out of office at the next opportunity, before they can do more harm.

     If we’re to get back to business as usual before this becomes more than a minor inconvenience, it’s high time to know our enemies and name them. Grant their fear-mongering no more credence. Sensible precautions only:

  • Keep clean;
  • Cover when you cough or sneeze;
  • Minimize physical contact with non-family members;
  • No kissing random strangers!

     End the paralysis! Ordinary Americans – especially those who work in and own America’s four-million-plus small businesses – must take their freedom into their hands and insist on it. The hour is late indeed.

     No power is strong enough if it labors under the weight of fear. – Marcus Tullius Cicero

6 comments:

Kye said...

Ever since a few leftists at sites I comment and some I know personally showed an objection to using the terms the Wuhan Flu or Chinese Corona Virus I made a change.

I was told they were "raaaaacist" and asked since when Chinese became a race? I informed them they could have a point if I was using the Asian Virus which is a race but Chinese is an ethnicity not a race. All Asians are not Chinese (ask my Korean wife).

Therefore, as a compromise I have been using the term Red Chinese Flu for the past couple weeks and have driven the leftists completely insane. Mission accomplished!

JWM said...

I do not fear the virus as much as I do the concerted effort by the television networks, and newspapers to sow doubt, and discord, and to undermine every effort that the President is making. This can lead only to chaos. They are playing with fire in a barn full of straw. Will they be happy to see riots in the streets? Martial law? A body count that dwarfs anything brought on by the covid virus? I believe they either do not care what the results of their campaign of lies and slander produce, or that they hope to see the dreadful stuff I just mentioned come to pass. In any case what the media is doing is Evil, with a capital E. Damn them to hell.

JWM

pc-not said...

These state-wide shut downs are insane. In a micro economic sense, I will give an example. I am a retired builder, but work almost full time. I let my licenses go years ago, so I no longer can pull permits. Most of my business comes from former clients wanting minor remodels done. I am in the process of such an endeavor right now. About halfway through a 3 month project on a beach house ere in Northwest Florida.

If we had followed suit as NY, CA and IL have done, I would have lost over $1,500 in labor alone during the past few days. Since I am collecting Social Security benefits I probably would not qualify for the proposed federal payout to those affected by the"shut down". For arguments sake, let's assume I would get the thousand dollar payment as compensation for "complying". Still a massive net loss, considering that payment would not be forthcoming every week to every working American.

By using common sense precautions as you have outlined, I will maximize my economic well being as well as fulfill a client obligation to have the property habitable and productive again. I basically work alone anyway, so self quarantining at home would have been a double negative. Multiply this by millions of other scenarios and I think you will appreciate the macro economic impact of power hungry elitists' decisions.

Andy Texan said...

The way out of this morass is for the President to command the mass production and distribution of those known efficacious drugs and then tell fellow citizens to get back to work. The CDC and nay-sayers must be steam-rolled.

Jess said...

It doesn't make sense to quarantine to the point the damage is worse than the illness could ever have caused. I think that point is at the end of this week, and regardless of mandate, people will rebel.

Linda Fox said...

A 2 week halt is probably not fatal to the economy. It does give Trump and his men time to find treatments/effective antiviral, as well are get the medical supply and medication manufacture kick-started - and to build up the oil reserves (thereby both refilling them cheaply, and keeping the oil business propped up.

Short term, I don't like all the expenditures (However, there's a huge difference between legislation that permits the expense, and those that mandate it - Trump has left money unspent before. He's kind of a cheap guy - which is not a slur, but praise. He knows how to bring in a job under budget.)

Long term, he's both making major changes in how government responds to crisis, and pursuing his own agenda of cutting regulations. He's using this to set his goal of bringing manufacture back to the USA, as well.

I'm inclined to cut him some slack. It's clear that the Left did not expect him to move so swiftly - they expected a response that they could use to tag him as an uncaring, ineffective Hoover-type. They anticipated this would coast into completely destruction of the economy, massive unemployment, and triumph just cresting befor the Dem convention.

Ha! Got you again!