A Note of Hope

There is a video embedded in this Daily Wire article done by a pulmonologist at one of NYC's leading hospitals. He is seeing almost 100% Covid-19 cases during New York's meltdown, yet he brings a note of hope as to how avoid the virus, dealing with someone in your family who is sick, and the general treatment picture. It's long, but well worth watching. 


https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-this-video-from-a-doctor-on-the-frontline-of-the-coronavirus-will-make-you-feel-a-whole-lot-better

A Modest Proposal

The Democrats have now stalled a national economic relief bill twice today. Unbelievable! We have people and businesses just hanging on over the coronavirus crisis and they tank it because they want pork - solar power handouts, union goodies, abortion money. Grrrr...

Fine. Put the Senators who are self-quarantining  in hazmat suits with self-contained oxygen, fly them to DC in private jets, and have them come to the Senate so attired and vote. The Dems deserve to hang on this one. So push the lever and let them drop. 

A Post Coronavirus Hope

The end of the coronavirus crisis is not yet in sight, but there are some hopeful signs. New quick turnaround tests are being deployed in large scale trials, hydroxychloroquine is showing great early promise as a cure, and vaccines are 10 months to a year out. This being the case, it is not too early to begin learning lessons that we will carry with us as we enter the post-virus era. The one that I want to focus on here is summarized in two words: Slow Down!


We have been a "Go-Go" society pretty much across the board for a long while - too much work, kids over-scheduled with sports, extracurricular classes, even vacations so tightly scheduled in order to "see everything" that we come home and are exhausted. This has led to burnout at all levels, even kids. 

One of the things that I have been starting to hear is that the enforced slower pace that most of us are now living is actually kind of nice in allowing us to enjoy the luxury of time. As a lawyer, I was once told by an older hand to be sure to balance my life between career and family. After all he said, no lawyer's last words were, "Gee, I wish I had more billable hours!" Sage advice and I hope one of the points of recalibration in all of our lives that we act as we move into better times. 

Corporate Responsibility - Exhibit A

I posted a blog piece about corporate responsibility, or rather the lack thereof, in terms of gutting American industry in favor of cheap goods made in China by low wage or even slave labor. OregonLive posted an article just this morning with an excellent contemporary illustration of my point. 

American hospitals face a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) such as masks, gowns, booties, surgical caps, etc. Today's article explains that this is because about 97% of PPE items were made at one factory at a city in China. As China's own coronavirus crisis became more severe, the Chinese government diverted production internally. Shocker! Totally unforeseeable I'm sure - not. This illustrates the huge difference between the "national interest" and a narrow "corporate interest." 

The U.S. is 20+ years behind in doing a careful analysis of what manufacturing is of critical national interest to this country and then taking steps to insure that this manufacturing is not off-shored, especially to China. When we need something NOW, we cannot wait and we especially cannot allow ourselves to be held hostage by a potential enemy. For an excellent analysis of this whole situation, I recommend Stealth War by Brig. Gen. (ret.) Robert Spalding, who did in-depth research in this area for the National Security Council and China expert for the Joint Chiefs at the Pentagon. 

 https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavirus/2020/03/medical-supply-imports-to-us-plummet-as-demand-soars-amid-coronavirus-pandemic.html

Living Through the Current Crisis

CBN had a good post about what C.S. Lewis and Martin Luther would have to say about our current coronavirus situation. Both are astute and applicable, but as a Lewis aficionado, let me quote the trenchant parts of his comments which, although about living in the era of the atomic bomb, are equally applicable today:

In other words, do not let us begin by exaggerating the novelty of our situation. Believe me, dear sir or madam, you and all whom you love were already sentenced to death before the atomic bomb was invented: and quite a high percentage of us were going to die in unpleasant ways. We had, indeed, one very great advantage over our ancestors—anesthetics; but we have that still. It is perfectly ridiculous to go about whimpering and drawing long faces because the scientists have added one more chance of painful and premature death to a world which already bristled with such chances and in which death itself was not a chance at all, but a certainty.

This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.

Amen. Bad stuff has happened before and it will happen again. The bottom line is none of us get out of here alive, so it's best to live each day well, secure in the knowledge that if the worst should come, God doesn't leave us or abandon us but instead ushers into a life greater than we can ask or imagine. Be sensible, but fear not. And don't hog the TP. 

https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/cwn/2020/march/what-c-s-lewis-martin-luther-would-say-about-our-coronavirus-panic

Corporate Responsibility

Lest you misconstrue, I am not cultivating a "Bern for Bernie," but what responsibility, if any, does have a corporation have beyond it shareholders? This is not as theoretical question as it might seem at first blush. Specifically, the C-virus pandemic has brought to light the disturbing fact that 97% of antibiotics used in the U.S. are produced in China, as is 80+% of our medical equipment. How in the world did this happen? 

It happened because large U.S. corporations focused solely on maximizing profits, totally disregarding such other considerations as national security, the effect on lives in this country if meds were cut off by a cranky Chinese Communist government, and a host of other important policy considerations. Should greed have ruled the day to the exclusion of everything else? A very interesting article published recent in Aviation Week says "no."

Capitalism has always been about "risk/reward" and author Kevin Michaels makes clear that he agrees with that. He traces the whole narrow focus solely on profits to Jack Welch at GE in the early 1980s. Welch spun off disciples into other industries like Harry Stonecipher who went to Boeing. When asked if the only thing he was interested in was making money, he replied, "You're right, I am." We all now know how that worked out at Boeing, where a culture of bean counters, very unlike the previous engineering culture, produced that magnificent machine, the 737 Max. 

The end result of the Welch approach becoming generally accepted throughout U.S. business was the hollowing out of American manufacturing, even in industries critical to our national interest and lives. Quarterly revenues became God as the focus was bumping up stock values. Michaels then makes the point that many executives now receive the lion's share of their compensation via stock options and concentrate on those quarterly figures with a laser-like focus. No conflict of interest there. 

There are some business contrarians out there and a few are mentioned. The bigger point he makes, though, is to ask whether this approach to corporate responsibility is really even in the best interests of the shareholders or is it just for a chosen few executives and some mega-rich players? It is definitely not in the national interest of this country and its citizens as a whole and it has to change. 

https://aviationweek.com/aerospace/manufacturing-supply-chain/opinion-rethinking-shareholders-first

Time on My Hands

My first trip (tomorrow to the Midwest) was scrubbed this after due to the evolving situation with the coronavirus (CV). I had my bag packed and ready to go, checked the airports that I would be traveling through for CV stats, locked and loaded with hand sanitizer and totally mindful of "social distancing" and here I sit. Oh well. Spit happens. As I sit here and contemplate what is in all likelihood an overblown response, several thoughts occur. 

First, there may be a silver lining in this dark cloud. We are already seeing that our country's emergency response assets are not ready. The CDC did not have enough test kits ready, slowing down diagnosis and treatment for many. We discovered that 97% of U.S. antibiotics and much of our medical equipment comes from China. What could possibly go wrong? Information has been slow to be disseminated in some cases. We have seen panic buying in stores. Toilet paper stocks getting cleaned out? Seriously? In short, I think we have become greedy and sloppy and if we got hit with a really serious situation - say an EMP strike, or serious pandemic, we could get clobbered. We need to fix these things and many others to avoid that.

Secondly, just as a hypothesis, the U.S. has been putting a world of hurt on the Chinese economy. What if the Chinese were looking for a way to knock the U.S. economy down a notch or two? Perhaps engineering a virus like COVID-19 that would not necessarily be traceable back to them might be a way to strike back. It might also be beta test to see how America's systems would handle a test like this. But the Chinese got hit too, so it can't be. Maybe, but they are not overly concerned with losing someone here and there, so if Wuhan gets drilled - oh well, spit happens. Maybe a scientist working with the virus went out for lunch unknowingly contaminated and spread it through contact. Spit happens. But what have the Chinese gained in watching how we have responded in terms of their future strategy? 

These are reasons for us to get busy. If we get hit with a considerably more lethal agent or action, we had better be a lot more ready than we are now.