Pandemic Journal Day 185

Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Supreme Court Justice, died on Friday, September 18, 2020.

Within two hours of the official notification of her death, the leader of the Senate (I refuse to name him but I will call him turtle head), was proclaiming that he would bring up nominations to replace her. She wasn't even cold yet and this turtle head was being a turtle butthole. He could have at least waited a day.

But no.

Of course, when Justice Scalia passed away in February 2016, turtle head refused to bring Merrick Garland up for nomination. Hypocrisy, thy name is Republican.

Turtle head will be remembered as one of the many reasons the United States is now a failed authoritarian third-world nation. I wonder if in 2000 years the United States' 250 years of existence will just be a footnote in the history annals. I strongly suspect that will be the case. So much for ever lasting democracy.

What a joke we are.

Our military might is the only reason the United Nations isn't intervening and trying to set our boat back aright. Instead we're all listing horribly and many of us are being flung into the deep seas, left to drown.

As far as the pandemic, I continue to physical distance. Kroger is a horrifying place to go into, and I do that infrequently. Their pickup is awful, and many times I do not receive the items I need. So I masked up and went in last week. It was panic-attack inducing. They are understaffed, and I could have died in Aisle 5 and no one would have noticed.

They have no one ensuring people follow protocol. They have no arrows on the floors for physical distancing. Just little happy reminders to "Stay six feet" from fellow shoppers. Like people can still read. Obviously they cannot, do not, or will not.

I have friends who believe that come November things will be better. I have news for them, bless their hopeful little hearts. The white supremist genie is out of the bottle and it's not going back in without a majorly bigly bottle and a very strong cork. We do not have either one. We are going to continue to decline. Things will only get worse, regardless of who wins the election. The only thing the election may do is postpone the ultimate inevitable. Or it may bring it on that much faster. I just know it's not going to help.

We are not the same country we were when the U.S. Constitution was written. Not that it matters - the current administration has simply dismissed it as the ancient piece of paper it is and gone about its merry way, wrecking havoc and sowing chaos and discord at every turn. But it's time for a new one, I'm afraid.

One that recognizes everyone who looks human IS human. One that is genderless. One that is secular and free of demons and gods. One that understands that the needs of a human being include not only "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," but also health care and a basic bottom line that is reasonable and just. And that justice as a concept applies to all, not only the monied.

I will be long dead before any of that comes to pass, though. Maybe my great-niece's children will step up, I don't know. I know the baby boomers are capable of nothing but destruction and selfishness. The Millennials are thoughtful and may come through as they age, but first the baby boomers have to step aside, and those in power will be a long time releasing it.

As a people and a society, we need to recognize that the good of the many outweigh the needs of the few. We need to understand that in order to function, we need one another. We are not little islands, set apart. Look at how much we miss one another during the lockdowns with the pandemic. We need other people, and not just those who operate within our bubbles.

We need everybody. Good, bad, ugly, conservative, liberal, screwy and straight. It takes all kinds to move a society forward.

When you become divided, so "us versus them" as we have now, then society stalls and stagnates. It takes artists and dreamers to create visions; it takes engineers sometimes to make those visions reality. We need all kinds of people to function, not only the ones a person wants to deal with, but everyone.

Every. Single. One.

To disregard lives for any reason, to throw them away simply because of stupidity - it's the biggest sin ever. And here we are, reaching 200,000 people dead from coronavirus just here in the USA. And there was no need for most of them to die.

We had no leadership when this began, no leadership now as we muddle through it, and I see no leadership in the future.

If we'd had leadership, we'd never have run out of toilet paper.

Public health should not be political. But everything now is political, and when politics enters any realm, it immediately, simply by definition, taints it. That's because the political is about power, and power lacks empathy, understanding, and compassion.

It always has.

I really hope reincarnation is a thing, because I want to come back in 2000 years and see that the USA is simply an asterisk in the annals of history. We may not even be that. We may as forgotten as Atlantis, a silly fable people tell and talk about as if it were real.

Because after all, we're not real now, are we? When reality fails and becomes what TV and talking heads make it, in spite of what your eyes see, then it is all imaginary anyway, isn't it?

In spite of the dead. In spite of the pain.

In spite of the lack of humanity.

Or maybe the world is upside down because we lack humanity.