My Blog Week: March 15 to March 21

A Word on the Week

Buying Our Way Out

First, a few policy points (because I have faith my readers are on the side of right, and don’t really need telling):

• Calling the coronavirus the Chinese virus is racist, and intentionally so.
• Don’t flush Clorox, Windex, whatever, wipes. And don’t throw them on the ground.
• Don’t hoard.

Now…

Trump has been called a pathological liar. That is, when he has no identifiable stake in lying, he lies anyway.

Often, apparently from laziness. He invents information or gives a badly distorted version of what he’s been briefed on, seemingly disinclined to go get information himself, or to present it with care. This seems ingrained in his idea of management…he has devolved to calling the ordering of errands performed by others, “work”. But the corollary to sending the flunky away, is the expectation that when the flunky returns, whatever the task, it’s been “taken care of”. 

So again we see a pathological state—defining the pathological as behavior for its own gratification, behavior that grows more repetitive and compulsive, detachment of that behavior from a foundation in reality. Trump wants only good news. The only good news he wants is that the last thing is over and the next soon will be. If people don’t bring the good news, he thinks they’re bad employees who should be fired.

Next, we have his addiction to rallies. Since he can’t have rallies, he’s having frequent bizarre and damaging press conferences, with a bizarre array of supporters taking the place of those special fans who sit behind him in the arenas. The good news problem may have had some influence on undercommitment to getting tests out to the states…which made underreporting probable, if not mandatory. This, even for a bad-intended person, isn’t good management. If most of reported cases must be the undeniable ones, the impression is much graver than it would be with a better spectrum of outcomes; knowing how many people have gone through the process and may be safe to mix with other “inoculated” people, and how many should remain quarantined. As the week has gone by, the numbers have come up looking bad anyway. And set to look worse.

What about the stimulus? Big corporations aside, some punitive thoughts seem in the heads of Republicans. They keep talking about taxpayers and working people. So those whose income is too low to be taxed, or who are not listed as anyone’s employee, may be loopholed out. Recent college graduates whose job prospects have been put on hold may be loopholed out too. Then the question of what it is that’s being punished…the idea of a dependent (or a retiree on Social Security who takes in less than is taxable), as opposed to those harmed financially by the pandemic “deserving” compensation…is not clear in its fine points. What about the old idea that all money spends the same, so less worry over how fair it is for this or that person to get some, and more available for everyone to buy stuff with?

Meanwhile, if you get money and don’t feel comfortable knowing people who need it more have been cut off the list, you have the opportunity to correct the administration’s errors. Make a reparation: give at least ten percent of your bonus to the United Negro College Fund. Or replenish the environmental funds the Trump administration has stripped: give to the Sierra Club, or the Environmental Defense Fund.