Susan Corso's Blog — iAmpersand

Day 75 An Offensive Defense; and, How Vulnerability Fuels Generosity

Notice the shadowy flag in the picture. Opinion columnist Charles M. Blow is not known for mincing words. “Trump put politics, his own political fortunes, over the lives of the American people, and the result has been catastrophic.” Nothing new here, right? The Outbreak aggregator went with this. “While the country neared six digits of death, the president who repeatedly criticized his predecessor for golfing during a crisis spent the weekend on the links for the first time since March. When he was not zipping around on a cart, he was on social media embracing fringe conspiracy theories, amplifying messages from a racist and sexist Twitter account and lobbing playground insults at perceived enemies, including his own former attorney general.” Again, just a yawn. Predictability is just so ... predictable. Columbia University researchers put forth a distinctly different model of the disease trajectory this week the theme of which is that had the U.S. acted just two weeks earlier, the death toll would be more than two-thirds less than it is. Mr. Blow again, “But Trump had spent the previous week downplaying the severity of the virus and blaming growing coverage of it and alarm over it on the media.” On the media. On testing itself. On China. On Obama. Or the governors. Or immigrants. Or the epidemiologists. Or the inspectors general. Or the airlines. Or any other of his flavor-of-the-moment pet scapegoats. Meh.

Day 74 The Curious Bonding of Loss; and, The Luxurious Bonding of What Remains

The six, solid, black-and-white columns of words—names, and the occasional salient detail that makes human lives out of them—that comprised the front page of The New York Times today was characterized in the second half of the headline: An Incalculable Loss. The smaller print: “They Were Not Simply Names on a List; They Were Us.” Us. “Each one is more than a name. Each one had a unique life story. Each one succumbed to the coronavirus pandemic that swept across the globe, devastating families and industries and dealing a crippling blow to the world’s economy.” One. Hundred. Thousand. Humans. Parents. Grandparents. Aunts. Uncles. Daughters. Sons. Brothers. Sisters. Nieces. Nephews. Friends. Lovers. Co-workers. Acquaintances. Strangers. One Hundred Thousand American human beings are dead because of Covid-19, and we, the us that remain, are bonded in loss, in crisis, in fear, and, sadly, in some cases, in loathing.

PandemicSusan CorsoMay 24, 2020metaphysics, coronavirus, COVID-19, #GlobalVaccine, Love, Kinsey Sicks

Day 73 The Erosion of Trust; and, The Ponzi Avalanche

“Just 17% of Americans say they trust the federal government.” Really? That many? “‘I don’t trust these people, I don’t believe them,’ said Curtis Devlin, 42, an Iraq War veteran who lives in California, referring to national political leaders of both parties. ‘The people whose interests they represent are donors, power brokers, the parties.’” Mr. Devlin is not alone. If the poll numbers are to be believed, 83% of us agree with him. Can you blame us? “Inside the White House, doubts about the official numbers [of Covid-19 deaths] are pervasive, though they come in different forms. Mr. Trump is in search of good news to promote his administration’s response to the pandemic and to press states to reopen.” There’s a whole article on how these numbers are compiled which is so convoluted that I could barely understand it. The bottom line, though, is that if the Calculator-in-Chief doesn’t like the numbers, he demands that they go outside the usual data channels of the federal government to find numbers that he likes. End run, anyone?

Day 72 The Inconvenience of the Heart; and, FourSquare Humility

Ever since the beginning of the journey of the coronavirus pandemic, opinion columnist Nicholas Kristof has been using the word “humility” as part of his recommendations for how to proceed. He did it again yesterday morning. His headline “Let’s Remember That the Coronavirus Is Still a Mystery” had a subtitle, “Respond to it with humility, and apprehension, too.” “The odd thing about reporting on the coronavirus is that the nonexperts are supremely confident in their predictions, while epidemiologists keep telling me that they don’t really know much at all.” He praises the humility evidenced by epidemiologists and laments more humility in our public discourse. What a relief that would be, wouldn’t it? But humility isn’t exactly at the top of the list of Character Traits We Think Worth Cultivating, is it? At least not in the West. In fact, I would venture to say that genuine humility is in the reject pile. Humility looks to a lot of us like weakness.

Day 71 The Religious Exception; and, In God We Trust, Of Course

New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced yesterday that religious ceremonies of no more than ten people would now be permitted in New York State as long as those who gather wear masks and practice strict social-distancing. In his daily news conference, he said, “I get it. Former altar boy.” Mr. Cuomo said of faith leaders, “‘I understand their desire to get back to religious ceremonies as soon as possible. I think that even at this time of stress and when people are so anxious and so confused, I think those religious ceremonies can be very comforting. But we need to find out how to do it, and do it safely and do it smartly.” He’s working with his Interfaith Advisory Council to get it done. The roots of these United States are deeply bound into the concept of religious freedom. It’s a fact that most Americans—persons of faith or not—are taught to be proud of when we learn American history. The founding of this country could, arguably, be said to rest on the freedom to worship as one is guided. Remember those words, freedom to worship.

PandemicSusan CorsoMay 21, 2020metaphysics, coronavirus, COVID-19, #GlobalVaccine, religion, In God We Trust

Day 70 Culture War, Drug War, Civil War; and, The Real Common Denominator

In my lifetime, there’s been a War on Drugs, a War on Terrorism, even a War on Illiteracy. In the history of the United States, the Revolutionary War is the matrix out of which the country was forged. When we managed to handle our exterior enemies enough, we turned to the differences within our own borders, et voila! The American Civil War.Then there are the Culture Wars. In this morning’s Times, San Francisco-based technology commentator Farhad Manjoo, a self-confessed optimist, writes, “Let us not squander another crisis. We need to take a long, hard look at all the ways the pandemic can push this little planet of ours to further ruin—and then work like crazy, together, to stave off the coming hell.” Whoa! What’s happened to Mr. Manjoo? I can tell you. He’s flipped polarities.

Day 69 With Authority Comes Responsibility; and, The Tomorrowland Solution

The I-Know-Better-Than-Everyone-in-Chief is taking hydroxychloroquine, allegedly preventatively, since his exposure to two White House staffers who tested positive for coronavirus. His personal physician says they weighed the “potential benefits and relative risks,” and the president decided, “What do I have to lose?” Even I know the answer to that question. The natural rhythm of your own heartbeat, Idjit. You don’t have to have heart disease for this to happen. Doctors all over the world are issuing caveats left and right, and wringing their hands over his lamentable example. But Mr. Trump doesn’t want to be an example. He doesn’t lead via good example. He wants, nay, demands, unquestioning loyalty, a willingness to be humiliated, and a self-conscious, sycophantic toadying that makes his followers not only seem weak, but be repeatedly weakened.

Day 68 A Genuine Anatomy of Caring; and, WIIFM?

Electricity, as we all know, can dry your hair, cook your dinner, and heat or cool your home. It can also electrocute you. Electricity itself is neutral. How you use it is what determines its outcomes. Strangely, caring is the same way. Caring, like electricity, is neutral. You have to go five definitions deep in the OED before you get to care in the way I mean it: 5. a.5.a An object or matter of care, concern, or solicitude. Under the entry for the verb, it means to provide for. You can actually care about anything, good, bad, or indifferent. Really, anything that matters to you.

Day 67 There's Always Been Activism; and, Now, How Can I Help?

If someone walked up to me and straight-out asked me if I am an activist, I wouldn’t hesitate to answer. “No.”I know activists, some quite well, and the ways I contribute to the social good look nothing like the passionate protesters of wrong that they are. I mean, c’mon, really, I know some of the original members of ACT UP. I know people who lived through the AIDS crisis in San Francisco in the 80s. Those people, they’re real activists. And if that’s the strict definition, then I’m definitely out. I’m not likely ever going to march in the streets, shrieking “Fairies, Faggots, and Dykes! Oh, my!” I was, however, Patience on the float for the opera premiere of Patience & Sarah in a long-ago New York City Pride Parade. But ... then I started to think a little more, dig a little deeper, go a little further into my own history, and you know what? I think I might be an activist, after all.

Day 66 Passing the Hot-Potato Buck Again; and, What’s Really Missing

Governors are one party or the other. State legislatures are the opposite. Legislators who disagree with governors pass laws that contradict the governor. Then legislatures appeal their law to the judiciary, the court systems. One sides with or against the other. Counties step in to make the granular decisions because of the gridlock upstairs. When that doesn’t work either, mayors and local governments attempt to make those micro-determinations. And the hot potato goes round and across the circle. Ad infinitum. The whiplash metaphor is battered at this point. The reopening of the country has become a horror show tilt-a-whirl of contradictions, accusations, exorcistic head-spinning, and as much sleight-of-hand pass-the-buck as anyone can bear to witness.

Day 65 Simplicity Out of Complexity; and, The Golden Key

Dr. Marty Makary is a surgeon and a professor of health policy at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. His ideas about how to deal with Covid-19 are, to borrow an Obama Era word, evolving. Ours should be, too. In “How to Reopen America Safely,” he writes, “The choice before us isn’t to fully lock down or to totally reopen. Many argue as though those are the only options.” Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, a former director of the C.D.C. in the Obama administration, said this week, “We’re not reopening based on science. We’re reopening based on politics, ideology and public pressure. And I think it’s going to end badly.” I agree with Dr. Frieden. After some consideration, I think it’s going to end badly, too. Here’s his upshot: “Having 50 states and more territories do competing and uncoordinated experiments in reopening is daring Mother Nature to kill you or someone you love. Mother Nature bats last, and she bats a thousand.”

Day 64 At War, Civil War; and, The Future of our Children

A new study, out in Lancet, is at last drawing attention to coronavirus and children. Until now, children who have been ill were counted simply as a minimal part of the pandemic. However, now that there’s been a study that measures the metrics, the children of the world are front and center. It made me think that perhaps in the crisis mode that we’ve all been living for two months, we have given little thought to what this pandemic means for the children, the youth, and the young adults of our world. And still, the virus keeps coming.

Day 63 A Swamp of Reasonable Doubt; and, A Symphony of Sirens

“Two distinct sounds have been competing in New York City’s streets during the coronavirus pandemic: the wail of sirens and the songs of ice cream trucks.” What a perfect dichotomy to represent where we are with the Trump Pandemic. Paul Krugman put it so eloquently: “As Andy Slavitt, who ran Medicare and Medicaid under Barack Obama, puts it, Trump is a quitter. Faced with the need to actually do his job and do what it takes to crush the pandemic, he just gave up.” Things are so fast, furious, and contradictory that I’ve switched my metaphor from Wimbledon singles, now I see which proceed at a relatively sedate, matronly pace, to championship table tennis a.k.a. ping pong, which is so fast that sometimes, the bouncing ball disappears. “[T]he public is also wrestling with a barrage of conflicting messages.”

Day 62 The Or Belief Systems; and, The And Belief Systems

The notoriously close-knit Hasidic Jewish communities have been hard hit by the coronavirus. Even so, many of them, celebrating their newly-restored health in spite of their grief, have driven long distances to donate blood plasma, “rich in the antibodies they generated when they were sick with Covid-19. [P]ublic health data suggests that the Orthodox and Hasidic community may have been affected at a rate that exceeds other ethnic and religious groups, with community estimates placing the number of dead in the hundreds. ... [T]housands have donated blood plasma, which public health officials believe may be used to help treat people suffering from Covid-19.” The chief Liar-in-Chief cut short and stomped out of a press briefing when “a Chinese-American reporter pressed him on why he suggested she ‘ask China’ to respond to her question on coronavirus death rates.” He accused her of asking a “nasty question.”

Day 61 Take It From the Top or Bottom; or, Fear in Cyber-Disguises

It’s time to talk about the fear again. In fact, it was fear, unaddressed fear, that prompted this series of essays, now in its third month. Humans have as many different reactions to fear as there are humans. Having spent most of my life counseling people about what boils down to their fears of all stripes, I think it is safe to say that there are two major approaches to fear, under which all variations on a theme fall. They are: from the bottom or from the top. Consider approaching a mountain. You only have to go one way. Up or down. Do you start at the bottom and go up? Or do you start at the top and go down? It won’t surprise you that it really depends upon what you believe about gain; well, the cost of gain.

Day 60 Mothers & Sons; or, How to Keep Your Own Faith

I wasn’t quite sure how I would put together writing about the coronavirus pandemic that is leading our world at the moment and motherhood, but I wakened this morning thinking of my mother and the remarkable things she did when she was here, and, my faith would tell me, must be continuing wherever she is now. Here’s where my memories took me. All the characters in this world drama we have no choice but to witness right now had mothers. Every single one of them.