DESTRUCTIVE FIRES ARE BURNING EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK!

     There is no escaping the fires of destruction.  So often we hear analysts and commentators, politicians, and professors – along with ordinary citizens –claim that America is strong, resilient, and innovative and that we will overcome all challenges thrown at us.  Or we hear that there are no real challenges, “everything is fine” – in fact, we are at record levels of growth and development; and, that the Corona virus will “magically disappear.”  Or we hear from Big Lie adherents that what we see and hear is not true – that everything that happens to question the truth spoken by The Leader (Fuhrer) is a “hoax.” OR, we are led down imaginary paths by conspiracy theorists who are unequaled in their ability to fabricate situations by which “some outside force” is to blame for everything that happens to have a negative impact.

No matter what is said by any of us, the fires are burning and incinerating.  And, in this case, by “fires” I mean a long list of destructive forces burning us up, down, over and out.  We are at the mercy of these fiery forces and we are not extinguishing them.  Instead. we are watching helplessly as responders are fighting in vain to stop the devastation that threatens so much we care about, including property, heritage, accoutrements, infrastructure, neighbors, relatives, children’s future and adult lives and livelihoods.  Dare I try to list some of those growing wildfires for fear of being vilified, ignored, or made into some sort of dunce or devil?  Such reactions from the unchecked arsonists are of little concern because they too are in the path of one or more of these fires or their deadly smoke creeping up on unsuspecting victims.  

    Here are some examples to contemplate:
1.      a scorcher of a viral pandemic that is out-of-control
2.      wildfires in the Western USA
3.      deadly smoke spreading East
4.      hurricane blasts in the Gulf coast area with r  ecord rainfall
5.       a conflagration of corruption and authoritarianism in our federal government
6.      the burning down of the mission and purposes of certain parts of our national (and State) government
7.      a destructive flame applied to the reputations, personalities, skills, courageousness and lives of people who act to undo the corruption, the de-construction and the institutionalization of racism, favoritism, privilege and elitism that keep us from realizing our ideals and our democratic goals
8.      the hidden fires that eventually consume the institutions we have cherished and nurtured for centuries, including public education, separation of church and state, scientifically-based offices like the CDC the NIH, the EPA; the development and protection of workers with union rights and benefits
9.      the fires of ideologizing and politicizing are attacking benefits of government like public healthcare, social security and Medicare that protects elder citizens from being singed by inadequacies; safety nets for food, housing, and wages; consumer protection from unsafe goods or services; middle class advancement, along with protection and advocacy for the vulnerable like the poor and those challenged both mentally and physically.  Consuming fires of caste divisions, favoritism for the richest class and the slogans of laissez-faire capitalism run amuck rarely confronted with progressive and prolonged assertive measures.
10. The Judiciary is being burned to a crisp as hundreds of unqualified judges -- qualified solely on the basis of their ideology and their loyalty and fealty to a despotic leader --are appointed to the federal courts including the Supreme Court
11. a leader who admires and emulates despots from authoritarian countries is burning through our alliances and allowing, even inviting, the destructive hot winds of oligarchs to fan the flames of foreign interference in our lives
12. it is, perhaps above all, the fire of personal desire to be King that is driving the destructive fires of voter suppression, oppression, and nullification that can only result in the destruction of our democratic system.  The fire that burns perhaps with the greatest intensity is the all-consuming fire of narcissism and personal victory that leads someone like Donald Trump to undo the guardrails that hold an entire election system within reasonable and effective boundaries.  The attacks on the voter franchise is burning our democracy to the ground. Inviting foreign intervention, disrupting  the delivery of ballots by mail; closing down polling places; using federal troops or agents to intimidate voters, hiring loyalists to ‘watch’ the polls, and declaring that voting is already ‘fixed’ are destructive flames that we cannot tolerate.  It is a warning to every voter that Trump is out to make your vote go away like the last smoldering embers of a campfire
13. There are more fires of devastation that could be mentioned, like destruction of consumer groups, attacks on immigrants, protestors, and Black Lives Matter participants falsely painted as insurrectionists and looters.  There is the devastating fire of police brutality visited upon men of color that speaks to the arson of neglect and cover-up that burns with the intensity of racism, prejudice and disunity.  There is the fire of attacks on immigrants, on soldiers who fought in foreign wars, on women who still lack basic rights granted to men; on LBGQT members who get little mention and less respect; on children who are being left behind by lack of school funding, lack of health care, lack of adequate food and shelter, and lack of a head start in early education classes. There is the fire of gun violence stoked and promulgated more and more in the outward display of militaristic weapons by Far-Right extremist militias at demonstrations that they oppose or at gatherings they initiate.  As “The Trace” reports it goes even further as such paramilitary groups: “force their way into a statehouse, threaten public health officials over coronavirus measures; intimidate Black Lives Matter marchers, and shoot law enforcement agents and demonstrators for racial justice” and soon to be stationed near polling places to intimidate voters!   

But, there is only so much we can bring to immediate attention in this short piece.  As I said at the beginning: fires of destruction are burning everywhere, and we have failed to extinguish those fires.  Like Republican Senators, many lack the will, the incentive, and the courage to finally extinguish those fires.  They would rather emulate the arsonist in the White House and burn it all to the ground, calling it by the term: “de-construction.”  They, and their ilk, would rather see people die from the burns of those fires, even though they could easily – with strong bi-partisan action – save thousands of lives.  It is as though the sacrifice of lives of our people is of less concern to them than the opening of businesses, of sporting events, of places to eat than is doing the hard work of using the public and private sectors to put out all these fires and to put enough resources into all areas of need to come out of the destruction with new ideas, new concepts, new systems, new institutions, new rules, new processes that can contribute to a nation that is demonstrating the reality of its Ideals. 

However, this cannot be done with the systems of the status quo.  Too much of that status quo is itself in danger of burning in the fires we have allowed to start and flourish.  Republicans don’t have any good answers – they are too busy  believing that the fires of neglect can be extinguished by coddling the rich with special breaks and privileges and letting their success and money trickle down to the rest of the groups on their hierarchical ladder.  It is not working now and hasn’t for at least a century.  The GOP - which might now be called Trumpissants -- has nothing to offer --absolutely nothing!  What about the Democrats?  They are at times found wallowing in progressive soup without taking stock of the underlying causes of that bowl and its contents or how it got to where it is.  The Democratic Party must awaken from its slumber and begin to deal with systemic change and reform, rather than obsess with the microcosmic issues of the day. 

For example:  Medicare-for-all is not the complete answer to healthcare for all because our healthcare system is flawed even as it meets the needs of many seniors. It is currently flawed by the same underlying principles that start these fires in the first place.
1.      we do not have enough nurses and we do not pay them enough when we do
2.      medical training is not the best we can do because it is too often evaluated by insiders rather than neutral resources
3.      hospitals are woefully understaffed and poorly conceived in terms of mission and process; rural hospitals are sometimes non-existent or isolated
4.      medicines and drugs cost way too much 
5.      the public health system is geared to administration more than to health service delivery
6.      it is run by and for the wrong people, just like most of our institutions – and that’s the biggest flaw of all that Dems and GOP rarely address.

Democrats would rather deal with the issue of minimum wage than to investigate why nurses are underpaid.  GOP would rather give extra money to successful and large corporate drug chains or private hospital health service providers than to deal with who is and who is not making the decisions about healthcare needs and services.  There’s the rub, my friends.

  When we dig under the cause of most of these raging fires, we find some questions that most officeholders are reluctant to ask, like:
·      how many nurses or patients serve on the boards of hospitals? who does serve and how are they chosen?
·      why are politicians only talking to Big Pharm lobbyists when they talk about drug prices?
·      what services do people most need from our public health system? – who other than professionals and administrators give out answers? – any potential patients from the immediate neighborhood being heard?  Doubtful…
·      how come drug conglomerate CEOs make enormous salaries with benefits, but drug prices continue to rise sky-high for seniors?

We probably need more representatives like Katy Porter and AOC who are not afraid to question administrators and CEOs at the deepest levels as to what their systems are doing to people. If we believe an authority and professor like Robert Reich (“The System”), here is the key to change:

  “Don’t confuse attractive policy proposals with changes in the system as a whole.  Solving those systemic problems requires altering the allocation of power.  Most important, you will need to understand the nature of power – who possesses it and why, how it is wielded and for what purposes.  Power is the ability to direct or influence the behavior of others.  On a large scale, power is the ability to set the public agenda – to frame big choices, to influence legislators, and to get laws enacted or prevent them from being enacted, to assert one’s will on the world.  It is the most subterranean force.

“Power is exercised through institutions – big Wall Street banks, global corporations, the executive and legislative branches of government, the Federal Reserve and the Supreme Court, the military, elite universities, and the media (including social media).  In the system we now have, power and wealth are inseparable.  The first step in changing the system is to understand it and then change it for the better.”

What does that mean in today’s world that is burning down around us?  How do we strongly address climate change for instance?
·      by making laws that severely affect the fossil fuel conglomerates in terms of profits, size, monopolistic status, and their excessive welfare payments made to themselves from a federal tax structure that they helped to create
·      Prohibit paid lobbying. 
·      Don’t put fossil fuel CEOs into government;
·      require profit-sharing with workers and communities in which they are located; 
·      Impose harsh penalties that will negatively affect corporations and businesses that do not meet strict environmental standards against polluting water, air and earth.  Small fines and short incarcerations of scapegoats are not effective

It will never be enough to save certain animals, to call for conservation measures, to make more solar panels.  This is literally a battle for power – the power of who makes decisions, who receives or doesn’t receive government help, and who has the ability to influence laws and regulations.  To make change, the system that supports these arsonists must be drastically altered.  And those same principles must be applied to other problems as well.  It is a question of wealth and power, not of polar bears, melting icebergs and how fires start in the forests of the Western states.

Look behind the candidates for office.  Who supports them?  Where are their campaign funds coming from?  How are their decisions made – with input from ordinary citizens or almost entirely based on input from sponsors and special interests?  What kinds of legislation do they propose to co—sponsor or author?  What systemic changes have they brought about, or advocated, in terms of major exploding fires of discontent and loss of voice? Stop electing people based on Party and ideology.  Elect only those who promise to shift the locus of power and wealth from oligarchs to normal citizens.  Playing politics and approving inadequate measures for combatting the issues of the status quo will not solve problems of control and oversight by the few who see themselves as elitists not subject to the rules that they insist be applied to everyone else. 

Destructive fires are burning everywhere, and we cannot extinguish them until we insist on taking back the power surrendered to those who have caused them. 

 

ADDENDUM

      NOTE 09/22/2020: The death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has not only left us with heavy hearts, but has ignited a maelstrom  of  unfortunate rhetoric and behavior related to the empty seat on that Court.  The battle over that seat will ignite one more destructive fire that could produce effects that last for decades.  The indomitable and gracious spirit of Justice Ginsburg will be a necessity for many to emulate in an unrelenting effort to maintain the integrity and independence of the Supreme Court and of the entire judicial system.  May her spirit be a source of strength for many and may she abide in the peaceful reward of a life well-lived.