A single sentence and a question about voting rights
“The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
——The 15th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
Here’s the question:
Why isn’t this enough?
koshersalaami
07/10/2021 @ 11:16 am
The text of the laws do not reference denial or abridgment. That’s why it’s not enough. It would have been enough if the Supreme Court still enforced the Voting Rights Act but as long as they don’t acknowledge the real purpose of these laws it won’t be enough.
I go back to Anatole France’s observation that the rich and poor are equally prohibited from sleeping under bridges.
Ron Powell
07/10/2021 @ 12:36 pm
15th Amendment Section 2:
“The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.”
If filibuster is the only impediment to preserving the right to vote and the democracy, it seems to me that there is a constitutional and moral imperative to do away with both the filibuster and the electoral college.
The Dems must rejuvenate the Voting Rights Act by passing HR1 and HR4.
And
If they don’t get rid of the electoral system of tallying the results, the right to vote won’t mean anything.
As long as the Republicans can alter the process and outcome in counting of votes cast, this country is in more trouble than than anyone has been able, or willing, to articulate to this point…
Jonna Connelly
07/10/2021 @ 8:51 pm
Wasn’t it once (ie during the time of the Voting Rights Act determined whether or not a given system denied or abridged rights by the impact of a law as well as by the stated intent? And hasn’t that changed with the Roberts court – or is it the Alia court? So the yahoos in Texas and GA and MI have wised up enough not to name the groups they want left out, they’re content with impact which this political, right wing court doesn’t care about.
Jonna Connelly
07/10/2021 @ 8:53 pm
But, in the ehnd, I guess that was A France’s point, no?
Ron Powell
07/11/2021 @ 2:09 pm
Yes it was…
The full and complete quote:
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.”
In the end, however, “As long as the Republicans can alter the process and outcome in the counting of votes cast, this country is in more trouble than than anyone has been able, or willing, to articulate to this point….”
koshersalaami
07/12/2021 @ 1:55 am
Agreed. I wonder what will happen if a state legislature overturns its own state’s popular vote.
Ron Powell
07/12/2021 @ 5:07 am
There are several state legislatures who, along with their like minded governors, are so crazed with racism that they will indeed act to unilaterally overturn the will of the people, thus making the real question;
“What will happen if the ‘Trump/ McConnell Supreme Court ‘ratifies’ such anti-democratic measures?”
Keep an eye on Texas, Arizona, Georgia and Michigan as being the vanguard of this anti-democratic racist lunacy…
koshersalaami
07/12/2021 @ 8:33 am
Some of it is racism and some of it is power. Most disenfranchised voters will be White, so this will absolutely not be restricted to a racial issue. That has to be true because of the numbers. If voting were along racial lines there would be no need to overturn elections.
At this point I’ll make a radical suggestion. If the Court will not enforce democracy in a given state and they insist on being too undemocratic to recognize the results of their own popular votes, I suggest we consider ejecting them from the Union as cancerous. One can’t make the case that overturning their own popular vote on partisan grounds is what the framers of the Constitution had in mind.
Ron Powell
07/12/2021 @ 10:42 am
“Some of it is racism and some of it is power. Most disenfranchised voters will be White,…”
Inasmuch as racism is about power, it can be argued that it’s ALL about racism.
Unless the Supreme Court rules that if/when a state chooses to override the votes cast, it must be done statewide. However, the bastards will “cherrypick” the counties, districts, and precincts that are predominately populated by people of color…
If you can’t see that coming, you can’t see anything at all.
koshersalaami
07/13/2021 @ 1:01 am
Of course I can see it coming, but the question is whether the areas that are Black are chosen because they are Black or because they are Democratic and vulnerable. If Black people were voting Republican they’d face no limitations at all, so there’s a question as to exactly what is driving the train to exactly what extent.
The biggest problem here will probably not be racism per se, it will be a disenfranchising of a statewide voter majority by reversing the results for strictly partisan reasons, thereby negating the right to vote for the majority of the states’ voters.
koshersalaami
07/13/2021 @ 9:42 am
Let’s look at Texas. The percentage of Texas’ population that’s Black is 12.3%. For Democrats to achieve a majority in a vote that Republican legislators will now have the ability to reverse, the percentage of Democratic votes has to clear 50%. 50 (assuming no margin) minus 12.3 = 37.7. In other words, assuming that a higher percentage of Blacks that non-Blacks don’t vote (which may or may not be true, but logistics are more likely to be an obstacle to Black voters), about 75% of voters who would effectively have the result of their votes canceled by the State Legislature would not be Black.
This is not true in Georgia, where close to a third of the state’s population is Black. In Georgia, this can be done based on the race of voters. It is, however, true in Michigan, where the Black population is below 14%, and more so in Arizona, where the Black and Native American populations combined don’t reach 10%.
Ron Powell
07/13/2021 @ 11:36 am
“Trump pressured Georgia’s Republican secretary of state to “find” him enough votes to overturn the presidential election and vaguely threatened him with “a criminal offense” during an hourlong telephone call on Saturday, according to an audio recording of the conversation.
Mr. Trump, who has spent almost nine weeks making false conspiracy claims about his loss to President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., told Brad Raffensperger, the state’s top elections official, that he should recalculate the vote count so Mr. Trump, not Mr. Biden, would end up winning the state’s 16 electoral votes.
“I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Mr. Trump said during the conversation, according to a recording first obtained by The Washington Post, which published it online Sunday. The New York Times also acquired a recording of Mr. Trump’s call.
The president, who will be in charge of the Justice Department for the 17 days left in his administration, hinted that Mr. Raffensperger and Ryan Germany, the chief lawyer for secretary of state’s office, could be prosecuted criminally if they did not do his bidding.”
—–NYT
The attempts at “cherrypickng” votes to be discounted will be unilateral, arbitrary, capricious, and racially motivated and determined…
You can count on this due to the simple fact that Trump’s posture is that votes by people of color are fraudulent by definition….
Ron Powell
07/19/2021 @ 11:38 pm
BTW
“Some of it is racism and some of it is power. Most disenfranchised voters will be White, so this will absolutely not be restricted to a racial issue.”
You need to cut this namby-pamby half baked, half stepping bullshit out…
Stop trying to look, act, and sound like this is some kind of academic debate….
When you don’t call it what it is, and call it out for what it is , you give the racists cover…
You need to stop trying to ‘go one up’ on me rhetorically in this matter because frankly and simply speaking, YOU CAN’T!!!!
I don’t believe for a second that you have it in you to take your bullshit half-assed case to the streets where the fight seems to be headed.
Listen to people like: Senfonia Thompson, black legislator of Texas, dean of democratic Texas legislators, who are now political fugitives from Texas law, and Rep Joyce Beatty, Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, who was arrested by the Capitol Police for singing a protest song in the Senate building atrium.
What kind of racist imbecile would give the idiotic order to do that?
These laws are being crafted and designed to be selectively enforced specifically against black and brown populations PERIOD, FULL STOP.
That’s the message to the people who are specifically being designated in the legislative language to enforce these measures…
Anatole France isn’t one of them.
Bitey
07/20/2021 @ 10:21 am
My goodness, Ron. “Not restricted to…”, does not mean that the concept cited does not exist. It is not restricted to a racial issue. That is absolutely true. What’s more, if there were no racial element at all, the notion that democracy is being smothered by a gray for power would still be a serious issue. Democracy is seriously challenged in Russia, and race has little or nothing to do with it. The fact that totalitarianism is advancing and threatening democracy anywhere is a problem for democracy everywhere. Democracy is threatened in a variety of ways…”not restricted to”, racial oppression.
Ron Powell
07/20/2021 @ 6:02 pm
I figured you would show up re my last comment…
“Democracy is threatened in a variety of ways…”not restricted to”, racial oppression.”
Quite true and I’m well aware of the implications and consequences of the validity of your statement.
However, the primary existential threat to democracy in the USA is now, and always has been, RACISM…
You may say what you wish, but I believe that Joyce Beatty and Senfonia Thompson would choose to keep their collective focus on RACISM…
As would Cummings, Lewis, and King, et al…
“The fact that totalitarianism is advancing and threatening democracy anywhere is a problem for democracy everywhere.”
Yes indeed, quite true again…
However, you’re on your own running through the weeds and jumping down this rabbit hole…
Your comment/point may win you half a point during a rhetorical debate but, it doesn’t score a blow in the fight against the racism that is the underlying cause and motivation for the legislation that seeks to disenfranchise citizens and voters of color…
The white people adversely affected by these anti-democratic draconian measures are being written off by Republican controlled legislature as ‘collateral damage’.
Bitey
07/21/2021 @ 5:22 am
Ron, even your response acknowledges that the “primary existential threat…”. That implies that there are other threats. You act as if you believe that racism is the only threat, then you essentially repeat the logic that says that it is not.
And as for whether or not racism is the primary threat in the United States, that is an interesting question. As problematic as racism is, I see no reason why the US would be free of the challenges that exist to democracy everywhere else if the element of race were removed. If the last few decades has taught us anything, it is that we are not inherently exceptional as a nation. All of the lures of the unchecked power of totalitarianism remain if racism were removed. Also, you have previously acknowledged that racism is a device in a system to grab/hold power. If that is true, racism is subordinate to the desire for power. Power is the ultimate goal, not racism. Racism came into existence to assist grabbing power, so it could pass from existence without the need for it. All that is to say that racism is certainly a terrible thing, but it is not the greatest problem that civilization faces.
Ron Powell
07/21/2021 @ 6:23 am
“…racism is certainly a terrible thing, but it is not the greatest problem that civilization faces.”
This is true enough but black and brown people can’t begin to participate in the process of addressing the “larger issues” unless and until we are able to remove and dispell the oppressive yoke of racism in this country…
We cannot afford to dilute or displace our focus on the problem and issue that has threatened this democracy since day one…
The fact is that too many white Americans see their ‘democracy’ as a proprietary entitlement belonging to them exclusively..
We cannot cast our focus elsewhere…
We must “keep our eyes on the prize” here in America.
Bitey
07/21/2021 @ 7:10 am
I struggled to see how your comment about “weeds” and “rabbit holes” applied to my comment to you. My comment was straight forward and pursues clarity on the subject of challenges to democracy.
Then it occurred to me that you might be asking about racism and only racism. Why isn’t the 15th amendment good enough to end the racism used to weaken democracy? So, I misread your question. In my own defense, it is easy to see that a threat to global freedom, or even domestic voting rights is a much more serious concern than racism.
As far as we can understand it, racism is not the end in itself. It is the means to an end. So, the answer to your question is that…it is a means to an end. Maybe you have seen “2001: A Space Odyssey”. There is a scene where there are two groups of primates who seek to control a drinking hole. One member of one of the groups eventually finds a club on the ground and clubs the leader of the other group over the head, killing him, and gaining control of the water hole for his group. The tactic was violent and effective. That scene then moves into a scene where rockets are seen in space. The implication being that the club evolved into ICBMs, and the point is still control over some scare thing. The idea of intercontinental missiles implies mass destruction as the controlling leverage. With racism, oppression is the controlling leverage. So, why isn’t the 15th amendment enough? The answer is that because racism works, and it is not a moral consideration for those employing the tactic. Why is a prohibition against violence not enough? Because the club works. The missile works. Racism works, and racists are not concerned with your morals or your ethics. The racist oppressor might easily say, the Constitution and the various amendments, and even law itself…is only social media.
koshersalaami
07/21/2021 @ 12:33 am
Collateral damage is a two way street. Republicans would argue exactly the reverse: that Blacks are collateral damage in what is at its heart a partisan fight. They would tell you that if Black people were voting Republican they wouldn’t be targeted by voter suppression at all and would be supported by Republicans for public office a whole lot more than they are now. And, by the way, they’d mean it. I don’t mean they’d mean it like when they talk about ID voting laws to prevent voter fraud when we all know – and so do they – that that’s strictly a smokescreen for actual voter suppression, I mean they’d be utterly convinced that what I said was absolutely true, that what’s driving the train is partisanship, not race.
It really helps to understand the nature of mainstream modern American racism. The core of it is about how much collateral damage to the Black population is acceptable and that they’re operating under the delusion that they have the right to decide what’s acceptable to someone else. It’s not that most of them hate you. It’s not that most of them don’t think you should have rights. It’s that most of them think that the amount of collateral damage they think you suffer is acceptable. They think it’s no big deal, in part because they’re willfully unaware of the scope of that collateral damage. When they conclude that collateral damage has passed acceptable levels, like in the cases of the South Carolina church murders and George Floyd, they react en masse and they react fast.
Think back to neighbors you knew who voted for Trump and were shocked and appalled at how personally you took that. Those neighbors were not telling you they hated you. They were not telling you they wished you ill or that they wished to limit your access to resources and legal protection. They were telling you that they think your race-based problems aren’t significant. And what made you feel betrayed was exactly that: they didn’t value you enough to stick up for you. Yes, there are White nationalists out there and they are getting scarier as a result of Trump’s support but White nationalists aren’t the main problem. Your neighbors are, and they aren’t White nationalists. They’re White Americans sick of hearing about race because they don’t know enough of what goes on (and emphatically aren’t curious about it) to understand why they’re still hearing about race.
In terms of the sort of voting disenfranchisement they’re trying to enact particularly in Texas and Arizona (and I think in Michigan), that problem’s bigger than race. They’re telling the people in Arizona and Texas in effect that Democrats can’t win an election because if they do Republican state legislators will simply overturn it. There is literally no point in having an election. We don’t live in a normal country like the European and Asian countries whose citizenship is overwhelmingly based on ethnicity; we live in a country founded on at least an attempt at democratic ideals. What was the first complaint (DC still has it, even on their license plates)? Taxation without representation. They’re attempting to pull representation. They’re attempting to de-Americanize America across the board. The scope of the problem is way beyond race. We could be looking at what could turn into a revolution. From an historical perspective, there will be grounds for it.
Ron Powell
07/21/2021 @ 6:57 am
“Collateral damage is a two way street.”
Republicans are arguing that they are not making it harder to vote, but harder to cheat.
How can there be a two way street when there is absolutely no way black and brown people can inflict any sort of ‘damage’ on anyone anywhere?
Collateral damage may be double edged in some instances but in this matter it is most assuredly not a two way street.
“The scope of the problem is way beyond race.”
Both you and Bitey are making rhetorical points that can score in academic or even policy debates…
We can win the argument and still lose the fight.
We have to win the fight for social justice and end the struggle for freedom on the streets here.
“We don’t live in a normal country like the European and Asian countries whose citizenship is overwhelmingly based on ethnicity; we live in a country founded on at least an attempt at democratic ideals.”
An egalitarian, multicultural, multiracial democracy hasn’t become the ‘norm’ here either.
Too many white Americans are yearning for “normalcy”, as you describe it, and are willing to trade the democracy for autocracy as long as they are permitted and encouraged to cling to their racism…
Bitey
07/21/2021 @ 7:25 am
“How can there be a two way street when there is absolutely no way black and brown people can inflict any sort of ‘damage’ on anyone anywhere?…”
If this is true, then there is no reason for anyone or anything in power to concede anything. Power does not make concessions to purely ethical positions. There has to be leverage behind the request for power to concede something. Everything comes down to scarcity, value, and control. If it has value, but it is plentiful, like air, then there wont be any attempt to control it. If it is scarce, like food or water, then there will be attempts to control it. And the means by which control is managed will begin with putting a price on it. When that is disputed, litigation or war will result. No limited thing of value will be disseminated without a cost to the one(s) seeking access.
If there is “absolutely no way” black and brown people can inflict any sort of damage on anyone, then they/we will be removed from the competition for the scarce thing…whatever that may be. No civilization that I am aware of has operated entirely on ethical grounds, and it is not likely that such a civilization will ever exist. I do believe that there are ways in which oppressed peoples can exert leverage to achieve the justice that they seek. And if I am wrong about that, then their extinction is inevitable.
Ron Powell
07/21/2021 @ 8:32 am
“If there is absolutely no way” black and brown people can inflict any sort of damage on anyone, then they/we will be removed from the competition for the scarce thing…whatever that may be.”
Precisely why we are faced with this new wave of “Jim Crow” voter suppression legislation….
This is an overt attempt to remove black and brown people from the competition for the scarcest of commodities:
Social Justice and Freedom.
“I do believe that there are ways in which oppressed peoples can exert leverage to achieve the justice that they seek.”
Please explain and expound.
Keep in mind that “exerting leverage” is not the equivalent of “inflicting damage”.
koshersalaami
07/21/2021 @ 8:35 am
Ron,
Let’s start with my wanting to one up you. I can think of nothing more useless to me. This is, and always has been, about the issues. Arguing with you does nothing for my ego.
You’re misinterpreting “two way street.” You said that the White population losing the consequences of their cast votes were collateral damage. I think you have it backward. You’re saying that partisan politics is the collateral damage of institutionalized political racism, by which I mean disenfranchising voters. I think that the Republican view of these specific efforts to disenfranchise the political opposition to win elections is that institutional political racism is now the collateral damage of partisan politics.
You can’t defeat racism without understanding how it works. The mainstream racism of half a century ago plus is not the mainstream racism of now. The mainstream racism of now is practiced by a population who not only don’t openly embrace racism, they honestly don’t believe they’re racist. Most of the racism you’re seeing is practiced by people reacting to what they believe are exaggerated and unjustified claims about racism. I’ll encapsulate it in two sentences:
I’m not racist. Shut up already.
Bitey
07/21/2021 @ 10:40 am
Ron, my meaning for exerting leverage includes the threat of your words “inflicting damage.” My meaning is, a group in a position of power will not surrender any portion of that power without receiving something in exchange. In other words, a negotiation not only needs to be entered, but more importantly, a negotiation is always in progress.
To get something from power, those out of power, generally in greater numbers, need to exert the leverage to remove the powerful from power and replace them. That can be done in a variety of ways. They can be assassinated, like the President of Haiti was recently. They can be removed by the ballot, like Trump was. Or, they can be prosecuted for some crime against the state, and held accountable in a way that affirms certain values/laws that the society seeks to maintain.
The first of the three moves a society away from stability, and if it is a minority group that uses these means, they will need to become a majority group, or the process will turn on them. The latter two methods involve a minority forming a sufficient coalition and making a case for the stability of society. (The recent elections in Israel fit that particular model).
Those things which you derided earlier as “rhetorical debate” are the exact means by which change will be made, short of war. Coalitions form and issues are examined. Solutions are weighed against one another and then choices are made by committee. That is how any free society will work, to some degree or other. Conversely, a totalitarian society will make the decisions, and render the results to the groups for its reasons. If racial or religious oppression is among the values for the totalitarian society, then those methods will remain. If the values chosen by the free society hold other principles of justice higher than sectarian dominance, then that condition that we tend to agree looks like justice will result.
To say it more directly, the way a minority group can exert leverage to bring about change is to form a coalition which can bring the change, or develop some overwhelming force that makes it impossible to resist. Damage, or the threat of it, in some form, is always part of that equation. That damage can be financial, physical, or merely the removal of power.
Ron Powell
09/01/2021 @ 12:04 am
“…there is absolutely no way black and brown people can inflict any sort of ‘damage’ on anyone anywhere…”
“…the way a minority group can exert leverage to bring about change is to form a coalition…”
I rest my case…
Black and brown people cannot bring about change within the context or framework of unilateral action….
They/we must become allied or aligned with white folks which requires compromise re the articulation of of the grievances and further compromise re negotiation of remedies…
This can often occur without black and brown people at the negotiating table…
Ron Powell
09/01/2021 @ 12:29 am
“The fact that totalitarianism is advancing and threatening democracy anywhere is a problem for democracy everywhere.”
“…a totalitarian society will make the decisions, and render the results to the groups for its reasons.
If racial or …religious oppression is among the values for the totalitarian society, then those methods will remain…”
‘Totalitarianism’ entails the enslavement of an entire population…
Someone needs to tell that to the masses of people in predominantly white countries, including America, who are being swept up and herded toward dictatorial autocracy…
Keeping in mind that weaponized racism is a motivating factor in this creeping movement toward ‘totalitarianism’.
koshersalaami
09/03/2021 @ 8:35 am
“Someone needs to tell that to the masses…”
Well, yes.
We’ve just seen an unbelievable example from the Supreme Court which just basically and very casually overturned Roe v. Wade against the wishes of the majority of Americans. I find it interesting that one of the dissenting Justices was John Roberts. Unfortunately, I don’t think Manchin would go along with packing the Court or I’d absolutely recommend that immediately.
Ron Powell
09/03/2021 @ 2:14 pm
Frankly, I don’t beleve that Biden can be radicalized enough to attempt to pack the Court…
He has yet to come out explicitly against the filibuster…
Manchin believes that doing away with the filibuster would destroy the country….
koshersalaami
09/06/2021 @ 10:46 am
I don’t think Biden has the votes.
Bitey
09/09/2021 @ 3:38 pm
The “greatness” of America, and the rise to inclusion for oppressed peoples exist on the same road.
America is a place populated with people. The people here are like people anywhere, and are all motivated by the same basic needs. Meeting those needs is challenged by the same limitations everywhere. America (The US) exists and was born of an idea. These ideas were borrowed or learned from civilizations like Greece. America didn’t create them, and has no greatness in that regard. We are subscribers to Enlightenment principles, not creators. Much of what is assumed by those who assume America to be “great” believe that America gave birth to personhood, and such. To the degree that we hold to those principles, we portend greatness, and to the degree that we do not, we are just like anywhere else on the planet, full of selfish people with needs.
Another historical accident that has led many to believe in American greatness is the way WWII played out. The fact of the matter is, America’s successful contribution is mainly attributed to two large oceans protecting us, and a suitcase full of borrowed technology from UK, hidden from the Germans. We were able to develop radar, and the space program with borrowed/hidden technology from UK.
Any group of people can and will be great within any social system by doing that which America did. Access and mastery of information. Access and mastery of information. Access and control/guarantee of markets and valuable commodities.
Those holding power need all the same things for survival. Their need to meet their needs is greater than any racism. On a personal level, individuals may be irrational and place their racism ahead of meeting their needs, but a civilization can’t sustain itself that way. It has to meet its needs in the most efficient way just like a squirrel in the forest must. As it increases its efficiency, it is growing. As it misplaces its priorities and loses efficiency, it is dying.
America needs to support and expand its principles which define its essence, or it reverts to the mean. It begins to function on the ancient mechanisms which have controlled humanity since pre-history. We have never been very far from that, barely a generation or two, and we have taken a generation moving backward. Guantanamo, as one example, was corrosive to American style justice, and injustice can never be contained to targets of oppression. It will always spread. It has spread. It is spreading to the extent that we may dissolve the America that we once knew, imperfect, not yet perfected.
What must be done to have America continue as the idea from the enlightenment is to educate Americans about those ideas. It was always thus. Thus it always shall be. Short of that, war will ensue, and or subjugation.
Ron Powell
09/09/2021 @ 5:09 pm
@Bitey; Glad to see that you’ve come around to agree that education is the key to the sustenance and maintenance of the American experiment in democratic self governance….
Bitey
09/09/2021 @ 5:21 pm
I haven’t come around to that idea. I have always believed that. America is an idea. Justice is an idea. It requires education. That is part of the problem. Our country is not sufficiently educated. How our level of education compares to other nations is not quite the point. We are in a class by ourselves as we aspire to be a free, just state based upon an idea rather than “blood and soil”. And, we are failing that class in more ways than one. But, no, my notion of an informed citizenry is not a recent value.
koshersalaami
09/10/2021 @ 12:41 am
We are in a class by ourselves because we were the first to design a state around something that isn’t tribal. Turning one’s back on that is unAmerican.
Bitey
09/10/2021 @ 6:33 am
That is exactly right. We are exceptional only to the extent that we apply that principle and look at ourselves, other citizens, and all visitors who come in contact with the state in that light. Some believe that only citizens are entitled to the rights that our constitution delineates, but our current situation shows how justice is a vessel that applies to all, or it applies to none. “Extraordinary rendition” ruptured that vessel. Our racist foreign policy does the same. An increasingly regressive tax code, and economy built to cater to the wealthy and shrink the middle class, restrictive voting laws, all make us less of a just society. Even things as simple as “victim’s statements” in criminal court proceedings set individuals on a course of miseducation about how our society works. We have been on a course of self indulgence and community neglect for at least a generation, and the work toward making a great society with freedom and justice is being lost as a direct result. Yesterday, the President had to initiate a program of penalties and fines to get some 80 million Americans to get vaccinated. It has been lost on too many Americans that the “greater good” is a necessary value in order to be a stable free society. Far too many assume that we are only individual cells of self interest. Americans still need to be educated about how there are aspects of our lives where we benefit ourselves by protecting others first.
ArtWStone
09/10/2021 @ 10:39 am
I’ve been arguing on the side of “greater good” versus individual achievment for years with a friend. He is smart except for the distorted political views he claims to have developed as a poorly parented child, who was forced to act in his own self interest to survive.
He moved to Idaho a month ago.
I found that to be alarming.
I noticed a cough on the phone yesterday and asked if he masks up. The answer was hesitant until a “when necessary” type response was offered.
The a.m. text I just received says he did not complete his part of a potential business connection as he spent the night in an emergency room in Boise with “breathing issues”.
Friend or not it’s abominable to me that so many can choose to be reckless and have the audacity to oppose these new measures.
They can choose to care for others first but simply won’t do it.
It could be the undoing of us all.
Bitey
09/10/2021 @ 11:19 am
It could very well be.
It is alarming to see that the level of judgments we are required to make is much less sophisticated than one might have assumed. This challenge is about communism versus capitalism, or peace in the Middle East, or even expanding internet access to the portion of the world not able to participate in our new global economy. The stumbling block for the world, and that which might blast us into the darkness of isolationism and tribalism is contagion and how to handle it. People are letting notions of individual liberty, and suspicion of their neighbors motives cloud their reasoning about how to beat contagion. George Washington ordered his troops inoculated against smallpox. Our reasoning has fallen significantly what could be known 250 years ago. We definitely wont survive that. We are already taking horse deworming medicine. I’d say we are just about at the level of using leeches to cure illnesses, or burning witches at the stake. There is no way in hell that vaccination should be controversial in 2021. Yet, here we are.
Ron Powell
09/10/2021 @ 5:10 pm
@Bitey;
“There is no way in hell that vaccination should be controversial in 2021. Yet, here we are.”
It’s ignorance compounded by stupidity and a complete and total lack of common sense coupled with the absence of what we used to refer to as common decency….
We may well be living on the cusp of the end of civilization….
Bitey
09/10/2021 @ 5:19 pm
Uh, yep.
ArtWStone
09/10/2021 @ 11:46 am
I have met a few of the anti-mask/anti-vaccine types but not a one has ever suffered from polio.
Ron Powell
09/10/2021 @ 5:26 pm
Art, many of the people you speak of can’t tell you what polio is or why they, or anyone they know, haven’t contracted that disease…
The fact of government mandated requirements to become immunized against a wide ranging host of diseases is lost in the sauce of muddled memories and confused psyches…
These folks and their families did what was needed in order to attend public school because they were told to do it….
There was nothing voluntary about complying with the public health mandates of immunization as a prerequisite to entering kindergarten…
Inoculation and immunization were perceived as civic duties consistent with common sense.
Bitey
09/10/2021 @ 5:52 pm
Are you the same Ron Powell who said, “white people first” regarding the Covid vaccine? This sounds like an entirely different dude. Do you know him?