All they can offer us is shame

The "second wave" is here. It happened during "Phase 2" of reopening.

Louisiana reported another 1,467 known coronavirus cases Sunday, bringing its total to 56,236 as the disease’s dogged resurgence continued across much of the state.

Sunday's numbers reflected a two-day lag in reporting because the Louisiana Department of Health did not update totals on Saturday due to a planned power outage. But they again climbing cases within and outside of the New Orleans area and more hospitalizations and deaths due to the disease.

"Planned power outage."  The virus was spreading too quickly so they tried turning the Health Department off and then turning it back on.   It didn't help.

Even less helpful has been the behavior of the death cult caucus that has emerged from among the Republican ranks of the Louisiana Legislature. Last week they all posed for a photo together.

A group of Republican lawmakers who have flirted with a petition to revoke the state’s emergency declaration since early May revived the effort this week. Several Republicans spoke out against Edwards’ extension on the House floor Thursday, and later more than 20 gathered shoulder to shoulder on the State Capitol steps, without masks, for a photo op.

The petition, circulated by Rep. Alan Seabaugh, R-Shreveport, needs 53 signatures in the House. It would repeal the governor’s public health emergency declaration, which Edwards contends would put federal aid at risk, though Republicans challenge that.

“Quite frankly, it’s gone on long enough,” Seabaugh said of the restrictions.

It's disgusting that Seabaugh, et al would participate in a trolling event intended to discourage the wearing of masks which, it has been shown, is one of the few things most of us can do that actually makes a difference.  It's egregiously offensive for them to complain that the reopening guidelines have been too restrictive even as the news is breaking that plan has led to a massive new outbreak of the virus.  In fact, it's absurd for any of these Republicans to criticize the failed plans given that, by and large, they were written by panels assembled by the Governor, the Legislature, and by localities, deliberately loaded with political and business insiders so that the rules would be as unrestrictive and"business-friendly" as possible.

Probably the Republican lawmakers are just trying to see what they can get away with. They've got these new super-majorities to play with and if that means they have the numbers to overturn a governor's emergency order, it's hard for them not to see if they can actually pull something like that off. Besides, this is less of an argument now about how best to contain the virus than it is about what people can be made to endure. More to the point, it is about asking, when the designed-to-fail system indeed fails, where can we most easily direct the blame?


If we were really going to stop the spread of the virus we would do this. The US Congress would follow the advice of economists, like Stephanie Kelton here, and fire up the money printer so we can pay everyone to stay home until the virus is isolated or vaccinated. That is it. That's the only thing that would stop it.  But they didn't want to do that because our politics isn't really capable of doing anything but protecting the interests of wealth. So here is what happened instead.

Congress did print up some money. But that was only so they could send trillions of dollars to things like airlines, cruise ship companies, and the massively fraud based financial sector of the US economy.  The rest of us were left at the mercy of our bosses, the business tyrants who wanted to "reopen the economy" and politicians who wanted to "balance" that death drive with the perception that they care about protecting the public health. Hence, the "phased reopening" plans drawn up by all of those panels of worthies.

But if you "reopen," if you tell everyone to go back out under strange new circumstances where they must re-invent their operations on the fly while most misunderstand and some completely ignore the rules, then the virus is definitely going to spread. And so, guess what, now the virus is spreading.  Again, the only thing to stop it is to pay everyone to stay home but they still don't want to do that. So instead, now we must make a policy that will identify and penalize one individual scapegoat after another even as the virus continues to spread. And so that is what we are doing.

New Orleans-area leaders took a harder line against the coronavirus Monday amid rising infections in the region, with Mayor LaToya Cantrell warning of possible stricter restrictions on businesses in the city and Jefferson Parish President Cynthia Lee Sheng mandating mask-wearing for the first time.

Cantrell said Monday that more stringent rules in the city could come ahead of Independence Day weekend, after a task force she appointed last week found cases of non-compliance with current mask rules at local grocery stores and other businesses.

It's not that they're wrong to tell people to wear masks. It's just that every office holder with the charge to offer support and encouragement to the public during this time has failed to do that in multiple and compounding ways. And now all they can offer us is shame.

Here is John Bel this past weekend reacting to the very bad news about the rate of spread.

96 percent of today’s reported cases are associated with community spread, rather than congregate settings.

43 percent of today’s cases are from people 29 years old or younger.

It’s on all of us to stop the spread of COVID-19 in Louisiana. #lagov #lalege https://t.co/LbaBFwjOpu

— John Bel Edwards (@LouisianaGov) June 28, 2020

It's "on all of us" to stop it now. Is it, though?  The governors and mayors and senators and presidents who actually have the power to make policy, shouldn't this be on them? They've been pretending it is on "all of us" because that's what they need to say in order to rationalize these bogus reopening phases. But the phases don't seem to be working.  Turning around and telling every individual that it's on you to make the unworkable plans they've drawn up work is an abdication of responsibility. Politicians and bosses love to talk about "personal responsibility" when it applies to the powerless. But when those so-called leaders have already set up the objects of these sermons to fail, the admonition amounts to little more than bullying.

We did the right thing by going into lockdown. When the governor and the mayor ordered everyone to stay home back in March, we stayed home. But that was when we needed assurances from those holding power that they were in this with us.  We needed some guarantee of support. We needed to have our income supplemented with better than temporary unemployment benefits and a one time check.  We needed our housing stabilized.  We needed our jobs protected.  None of that happened.

It wasn't allowed to happen because wealth controls all the levers of power. Because Congress abandoned everyone and left the states and cities whose budgets were devastated by the shutdown to twist in the wind. Because desperate local business people yelled and screamed at the governor and mayor to "reopen the economy" and because the desperate governor and mayor obliged. And so the reopening, quite predictably, led to the virus coming back. But we're now not supposed to blame the governor or the mayor or the rich people they listen to. Nope. Instead "it's on all of us." Which is to say all (or any) of us can be blamed at any moment so long as it isn't anyone with any real power.

The insidious thing about this rhetorical trick is that part of it rings true. In certain ways, we really can say it is on "all of us" to deal with this. We should all wear masks and do social distancing when we are out. We should be checking on our neighbors. We should be looking for ways we can help one another. But none of this is a "personal responsibility." It's a collective responsibility. We all need to do it together. We need to support one another in the effort. "Personal" responsibility implies that we are each doing it in isolation where we are subject to bullying and shaming. The situation calls for mutual aid and trust. Not more policing and punishment.

We shouldn't have to endure the pandemic while also living in perpetual fear of a boss or a landlord or a cop.  We need to be able to trust each other. We need to be able to say "it's on all of us" and believe that in good faith. Unfortunately, it's quite clear our leaders are incapable of anything like that.