One thing you'll find on this blog a handful of times every year are posts that discuss some major ecological calamity that conclude that the whole business will be down the Memory Hole in a matter of days and forgotten, erased. And that prediction is always proven true.
Only this time, it's different. This time isn't about our kids, it isn't about our grandkids. NO, Dammit! This is about us. Right here, right now. This matters.
No, this time it's got us, got us good, and we're not getting out until it lets us out - unless it takes us out first.
That same Memory Hole we once used to flush this looming catastrophe, climate change in all its permutations, free of our collective conscience, has stopped flushing. Now we're getting waist deep in it. Next week or the week after we should be chin deep in it.
What we're seeing now, inescapably, is just the first of what could be a succession of pandemics that climate scientists (the discipline includes epidemiology) have been warning us about for many years. The only reason our governments were caught flat-footed on Covid-19 is that they chose to ignore those warnings in yet another example where "the economy" defeated reason.
This is where neoliberalism has taken us. This time it's coming for us. We were told this was probably going to happen. We were warned.
10 comments:
And right on cue, the SUN weighs in with
"We gambled on the wrong threat — climate change"
Why Italy?
I've heard that there are 10k Chinese workers in the Italian fashion biz that the China bought. Most from Hubei.
This is worth thinking about ...
"A “strange pneumonia” was circulating in northern Italy as long ago as November, weeks before doctors were made aware of the novel coronavirus outbreak in China, one of the European country’s leading medical experts said this week.
“They [general practitioners] remember having seen very strange pneumonia, very severe, particularly in old people in December and even November,” Giuseppe Remuzzi, the director of the Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research in Milan, said in an interview with the National Public Radio of the United States.
“This means that the virus was circulating, at least in [the northern region of] Lombardy and before we were aware of this outbreak occurring in China.”"
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3076334/coronavirus-strange-pneumonia-seen-lombardy-november-leading
.. Bang on, center bull m'man !! Well said, you nailed it to the wall
How's that 'Nation Building' going mr Trudeau ? mr Harper ?
Are we 'gettin to the gettin place' yet ? Growing The Economy ?
I'm reminded of that great quote from Josh Donaldson.. ex Blue Jay 3rd baseman
when the team was heading to the basement .. into the dumpster..
Was being interviewed about the team's chances .. and said
"This aint 'the try league' .. this is 'the get it done league'
and if you aint gettin it done, they replace you"
Ah yes.. Well, this is the Big Leagues now..
and what have you done for us lately ?
This is a chance at redemption Mr Trudeau
Historic times.. we need base hits, even a walk
just get on base.. move a runner over mebbe
a sacrifice fly, a bunt.. a solid at bat, work the count
Don't need a home run..
the fences are far far away and outta sight
All we need, all we expect..
is solid leadership & example, good swings
We're all on deck, or in the hole ..
ready to bat, pinch run.. whatever it takes
get into extra innings.. win it then bro
NPoV, the Italians should have freshly buried corpses to test their theory. Until then it's just a theory. I know we had a particularly virulent strain of season flu around that same time. It needs looking into.
As for the Sun, it never ceases to flaunt itself as a misinformation machine.
This is a great opportunity for Mr. Trudeau to shine as you suggest, Sal. Right now we're in 'disease management' mode, essentially a housekeeping function. If we're not to have recurrent disruptive events we'll need leaders of real vision, clear-headed thinkers. Could Mr. Trudeau rise to that standard? I don't know. He's been around since 2015. Have you seen signs of that so far?
If nothing else this pandemic is a powerful demonstration that, in some cases, the worst cases, hesitancy kills.
Mound, I think PM Trudeau is in over his head. His heart is often in the right place but that's where it ends. I have been suspecting for most of his term that someone else is pulling the strings and I think that someone is Bill Morneau. Morneau is to Trudeau what Cheney was to Bush, the brains behind the throne. Ever the banker, Morneau sees the world in financial terms and has no empathy for those at or near the bottom of the social pyramid. As you have pointed out many times Morneau's contentment with the precariat is disgusting.
I could be way out in left field with this. Chrystia Freeland certainly has a strong influence. Whatever, Trudeay doesn't have it.
You could be right, Toby. I recall the 2015 election campaign during which Trudeau said all the right things, made the grand promises, that were so inspiring. We would have electoral reform, First Nations reconciliation, and social licence would be the order of the day. These, and much more were promptly jettisoned in what, to me, seemed an overlooked turn to the neoliberal right. I too wondered if someone else's hand was behind that. Then we watched the KPMG/Isle of Man tax scam and the SNC Lavalin scandal to further undermine Trudeau's "progressive" credibility.
I know the Liberals have a reputation for campaigning from the left and governing from the right but, after Harper, Canada needed an evening of the political keel, a democratic rehabilitation. That much was promised and those promises proved worthless.
Today we learn that central Canada is bracing for spring floods that could complicate efforts to fight the virus and reduce the provinces' ability to shelter flood victims.
Our biggest problem today is that we have indecision driven by incompetance on one hand an greed on the other.
We will get over the virus one way or another.
what will we be left with?
The vultures of disster economics are flying much closer knowadays.
After the last turn down in economic activity the rich became richer the 5% became the 1%.
Soon it will be much worse.
TB
Perhaps this time, TB, those of us who comprise the rank and file, will know better and demand better than we've been given in the past.
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