Another Weekend Update: Clear and Nearly Present Danger

On Saturday there were large demonstrations in Washington and other US cities, and in cities in Europe and elsewhere, notably in the UK and in Australia, where the same basic issue as in the US reached its boiling point, namely the number of Indigenous or Aboriginals who died in police custody without a single conviction.

As a response to the militarization of Washington by Homegrown Hitler as well as to the issue itself, the demonstrations are laudable and inevitable.  But coming in the midst of the Covid crisis, they are also dangerous, especially when arrests and incarcerations are involved.

Already there is evidence from doctors on the ground of an increase in infections stemming from Memorial Day weekend, when so many Americans went out into crowds.  States like Florida and Arizona are seeing more cases and hospitalizations; Arizona's system is maxed out.  And there are scattered reports of protesters already testing positive.  One expert speculates that the impact will show up in July, and by then it could be an uncontrollable surge.

Apart from the demonstrations, there does seem to be a general attitude that the danger is over, and that people who "choose" not to wear masks or practice physical distancing are just adults choosing to take risks with their own health and taking responsibility for their own actions.  Such thinking and behavior is encouraged by the Trump administration, which vocally criticizes anyone who adheres to the guidelines of its own CDC.  Even people who disdain Trump are affected by this apparent permission.  When a few people stop wearing masks, it sends a viral message to others that not only is it socially acceptable to not wear one, it is once again weird to wear one. 

That people infect others, that almost half of infections come from carriers who have no symptoms, is conveniently forgotten. As someone in a vulnerable group I resent this, I take it personally.  It dehumanizes me, leading me to dehumanize younger people--I think of them primarily as vectors of disease.  And thoughtlessly or even callously aggressive ones at that.

So because of the casual attitudes, premature reopenings and now crowds of people who come together and then go back to their separate cities and towns,  it seems to me entirely possible that we will see a second wave bigger than the first, beginning not in the fall but this summer, in July.  We may be on the brink of a true tragedy.  Needless to say, I hope I'm wrong.

Weekend Update: Inside Looking Out

My first protest demonstration was the March on Washington in 1963, when I was 17.  I participated in many more in that decade--in Washington and elsewhere, some scented with tear gas-- and the decades since, until this one.  This time I'm a senior sequestrian, on the inside looking out.

The political dynamic has changed.  There really was a Silent Majority in the 60s through the 80s.  Demonstrations, particularly against the Vietnam War, looked big because my generation was big.  But those of us who protested were a small minority of that generation, and an even smaller minority of the American public.  And any kind of demonstrations really frightened the white majority, let alone the urban riots of the 60s.

Today, as some have remarked, the demographics of demonstrators against racism and police murders in particular are much more diverse, reflecting a much more diverse America in just about every way.  Maybe that's why recent polls show widespread support for these protests, even majority support.  Those numbers track with several other sets, suggesting that the AlwaysTrumpers are alone with their one-third of the electorate talking to pollsters.

Readers of this blog since 2017 may recall its analysis and warnings concerning the figure called Homegrown Hitler or the Apprentice Dictator.  Since then, the process of installing a dictatorship  proceeded in fits and starts.  Lots of fits, and incompetent but eventually effective starts.  The  administration as currently constituted is finally aligned with the apprentice dictator's power grabs, particularly the Attorney General.  (Other cabinet officials appear more interested in their own corruption, mostly financial but also political.)  This administration is quickly completing its destruction of the government it has taken two centuries and more to build.  It is turning the federal judiciary into a mockery of incompetence and ideological dishonesty.

The key to true dictatorship, as observed here a few times previously, is control of the military, or a significant part of it.  This past week Trump tried to take effective control.  He got what he wanted in a single sweep of Lafayette Park, herding peaceful protesters with rubber bullets, tear gas, explosives and huge military helicopters used as blundering instruments of terror.

But he lost control almost immediately.  He may regain it--he seems to have the personal loyalty of ICE and some murky federal vigilante force of prison riot specialists--but as the weekend approached, he was crouching in a heavily fortified White House, under attack most notably by members of his own party and prominent past members of his administration.  His current Secretary of Defense, caterwauling about dominating the battlespace of American cities one minute, was sobering up with direct opposition to Trump's threat of taking complete control by means of the Insurrection Act.

The opposition to Trump, now and as a candidate for reelection, is notably attracting more and more Republicans, from the gray eminence of conservativism George Will through Republican political consultants including the husband of White House toady Kellyann Conway to an actual Senator, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.  At the moment the most potent words have come from the ex-Secretary of Defense Mattis.  It's not just his opposition to Trump's latest moves in trying to misuse the military, but his global attack on Trump's leadership, in very strong language.  A number of retired officers and officials have spoken out, but I'm guessing the statement by the current Secretary of Defense reflects a frenzy of opposition and pressure from the active military leadership, who can't speak out themselves but who don't want this mission.

So this week saw the country come dangerously close to a military dictatorship, and then a reassertion, a renewal and a rebellion against that from the governing class and probably the military.  And just as importantly, a lack of public support for the demagoguery.  So in an odd way prospects are better, at least for now, than since Trump was elected.  Because Trump isn't fooling anyone anymore, outside his AlwaysTrumpers cult.  So now all we have to worry about is the covid crisis and an economic Depression.

Also this week Joe Biden made a widely praised speech in Philadelphia, providing a reminder and a model of what Presidents say and do in a crisis.  President Obama held a virtual town hall meeting, and said the young demonstrators are renewing his hope.

Meanwhile, the demonstrations have revealed more police brutality, some support for reform and against racism within the police, some provocateurs and looters, many peaceful demonstrators and supporters, including the neighbors of looted local businesses in Oakland who spontaneously gathered to clean up the mess.  Out there among them on the streets were Senators Kamala Harris and Elizabeth Warren, and Speaker Pelosi.  Joe Biden, now the elected Democratic candidate for President, visited a demo as well.  We'll see how it all looks next weekend, but right now, it does suggest the possibility of a turning point.

Poetry Monday: Rain Light

Rain Light

All day the stars watch from long ago
my mother said I am going now
when you are alone you will be all right
whether or not you know you will know
look at the old house in the dawn rain
all the flowers are forms of water
the sun reminds them through a white cloud
touches the patchwork spread on the hill
the washed colors of the afterlife
that lived there long before you were born
see how they wake without a question
even though the whole world is burning

W.S. Merwin
top photo: BK