Very strange. I went on an expedition yesterday to collect enough cat food to hold us for a week or so. I usually buy it at the Walmart in the next town over because they have the large bags (when they aren't sold out) and the kind of canned food the house cats like. But yesterday I got to the parking lot and turned around. The place was mobbed -- after weeks of lower than normal traffic through the store. So much lower that sometimes kids were skateboarding in the aisles.
What happened? I dunno. New Mexico is still on semi-lockdown, Gallup is shut completely. Most people have been unhappy about the restrictions, but they're unhappier about the virus, especially now in Indian Country where the virus seems to have free rein.
So I came back to our little town and pulled into the Dollar General parking lot. I can get cat food in smaller quantities there, and usually there's not a crowd. On the way, I passed the hardware store, and its parking lot was full -- the first time I'd ever seen that. There was a social-distancing line out the door. My doG, what's going on?
At the Dollar General, the parking lot wasn't full, but there were few carts outside, and when I went in, there were more people inside than I think I've ever seen. Only one was wearing a mask, and it was nearly impossible to "social distance." There was plenty of cat food, so I loaded up and waited interminably to check out. There were so many people. Most were buying just a few things but some had full carts of groceries and sundries -- as if they'd finally run out or hadn't bought much for weeks. Maybe that's what had happened. We and folks we know have mostly been getting groceries and supplies once a week, sometimes once every two weeks if we don't need anything fresh. But this was a case where people, sometimes in pairs, sometimes in groups (saw one group of teens numbering five or six) just out for a lark, picking up soda or sweet rolls, were jamming the store.
Very few wore masks or kept their distance.
So. We know that this thing is far from done and that the restrictions on businesses and social life have slowed the infection rate significantly. But still. Tens of thousands are dead -- officially up around 70,000; likely double or triple that given the deficiencies in testing and reporting. And the numbers are not declining. Expectations are for another spike as states "open up." And our rulers don't seem to care as long as the illness and deaths are confined to the old folks' homes, the prisons and jails, the Indian reservations, immigrants, the working class schlubs and so on. Herd culling. As they say.
We like to think of what's going on as some sort of accident, act of God, or what have you, but in fact deliberate policies are being implemented, though often badly. Some observers have pointed out that because of those policies, the ultimate death toll a year or two from the start of the Outbreak is liable to be in the million plus range in the US alone.
Given the way things have been going, that is widespread policy. "Let them die." The activity and business restrictions were put in place to control the spread of the virus, and they've pretty much worked. But if you listen carefully to R pols, they're nearly of one voice: "You can't stop the virus. You've got to learn to live with it." And studies have apparently shown that 80% or so of those who get it do "live" with it. Only 20% die, you see. And the deaths have been concentrated within the Lower Orders. As long as that's the case, what's the problem? Right?
It's interesting that the rightist activists clamoring for the re-opening of business are a relatively small bunch of loudmouths -- almost all white, some strutting around with their guns and camo -- and practically everywhere they appear, summoned by rightist media and organizations, states "re-open" almost immediately, or at least parts of the business and recreation sectors do. Yet over the years we've seen massive popular movements and demonstrations, literally millions in the streets over and over, be ignored (ie: anti-war, women's marches, March for Our Lives, etc) and/or be violently suppressed (ie: Occupy, Black Lives Matter, etc,) by our rulers. Get the picture yet?
In December of 2000, the Supreme Court yielded the presidency to the same radicals who are out yelling at capitols today.
The rightist demonstrators are not our rulers, but our rulers inevitably yield to them, no matter what they want.
So in effect, their demands are policy, while the people's righteous demands, no matter what they are, are routinely ignored or denied.
That in a nutshell is how this nation operates.
Clarifying, no?
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