Let's hope it's a good one

We begin 2022 in the middle of a great experiment. Policymaking deciders at all levels of government are attempting to find out what would happen if they just caved completely to the demands of the hooting death cult coalition of capitalist bosses and anti-vaxers who have been yelling at them this whole time to just let the virus do what it wants.

And, well, we're finding out.

"Omicron is truly everywhere," Dr. Megan Ranney, a professor of emergency medicine at Brown University's School of Public Health, told CNN on Friday night. "What I am so worried about over the next month or so is that our economy is going to shut down, not because of policies from the federal government or from the state governments, but rather because so many of us are ill."

The political calculus is obvious. Turns out there is a high tolerance for economic disruption, overloaded hospitals, and even people dying, as long as the politicians can say it isn't because of a thing they tried to do. In fact, every policy choice up to this point can be described as elected leaders desperately trying to get this bullshit off of their desk where it is someone else's problem. This stage of total inaction is only the latest, um, variant of that pathology to emerge. 

Schools are about to open next week. In New Orleans, where the response thus far has been to misreport case counts, and blame students and teachers who get sick for their individual "irresponsible" behavior, the plan now is apparently just to see how much more they can take.  

With the virus spreading, some staff and experts are expressing concern about what school reopenings could mean.

"There will be pediatric hospitalizations," Hotez said. "And what's going to be the other tough piece in the next weeks, keeping the schools open, because of this high transmissibility -- especially if you start seeing absences of school teachers, bus drivers, cafeteria staff."

Whatever happens, rest assured it will never be the fault of anyone in  charge. Their only real job has been to keep the workers from getting too uppity in their demands that their safety and well being be protected. And so far they've done that job perfectly.