MANSFIELD: Binding Up Our Nation’s Wounds

Photo by Anastasia Pantsios

The primary impact of the coronavirus on America so far — besides thousands of our fellow citizens dying, many needlessly — is the highlighting of just how deeply our nation is divided. Progressives on one side, at least for the most part, listen to scientists and medical personnel and are willing to shelter in place, since this is the most effective means of “flattening the curve” and preventing more deaths.

However, those on the right are meanwhile engaging in conspiracy theories, misinformation and downright lies in an effort to score cheap political points. Gun nuts in California are set to sue the governor over his mandate that gun shops close. They posit that they have a Second Amendment right to stay open, no matter if more people become infected by their selfish beliefs.

Unlike other times when the nation was militarily under attack and all citizens pulled together, this time there are scant feelings of unification, since the so-called “enemy” is not dropping bombs, but rather is moving with stealth as it creates havoc all across the land. While declaring “war” on the pandemic might make for good political posturing and theater for the president, it does little to stem the tide of infections and deaths. Playing politics with a deadly virus is not what the nation needs at present.

Indeed, if this were an enemy we could shoot or bomb, we’d be winning by now since we are the greatest military power the world has ever known. But the old saying that “generals are always prepared to fight the last war” couldn’t be more true or accurate considering how totally unprepared we were to combat this deadly virus that we can’t conqueror with lies and half-truths.

tRump listened to his war-hawk advisers, men that only wanted to build more fighter jets and battleships to further enrich the military/industrial complex — and thus paid no heed to the epidemiologists and virologists who for years have been warning in no uncertain terms that a virus, not bullets and bombs, would be the undoing of mankind on this planet and what we really should be preparing for.

So what did the anti-intellectuals of this current administration do? They fired the people who dared to speak truth to power. Those who dared to sound the alarm were (and for the most part still are) deemed disloyal to the president. Currently, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the administration’s most knowledgeable expert on pandemics (and the loudest voice calling for social distancing as the best means of stopping the spread of the virus), is now drawing sharp criticism from political pundits on the right who are accusing him of attempting to undermine the president — simply by stating facts.

As a nation we have always engaged in hubris and jingoism due to the aforementioned military might, but what is called for in this situation — what it will take for us to get back to a semblance of unity among our nation’s varying demographics after this threat passes — is a cohesive sense of national purpose, something that has been sorely lacking in the past.

We quite simply are a nation that has too many haters, too many reactionary conservative folk that have always only wanted success and prosperity for citizens that look exactly like them. That’s why we’ve had this monumental struggle to provide quality affordable healthcare for all, which, if it had been in place when the pandemic struck, we would be in a far better position than we currently are to handle and perhaps prevent the onslaught of deaths.

After the pandemic has passed and we attempt to bind up our nation’s wounds — and believe me they are going to be deep, wide and multitudinous — we have to ensure that everyone, especially “the other,” is treated fairly, something that has rarely happened in the past in this country. We will ultimately view this as a fresh start, or a tragic ending — the choice, of course, is ours.

From CoolCleveland correspondent Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com. Frazier’s From Behind The Wall: Commentary on Crime, Punishment, Race and the Underclass by a Prison Inmate is available in hardback. Snag your copy and have it signed by the author at http://NeighborhoodSolutionsIn

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2 Responses to “MANSFIELD: Binding Up Our Nation’s Wounds”

  1. William Rucki

    Spot on. We are already seeing that the bail-out is targeting the 0.1% and main street is getting the shaft. So looking out for “the other” has a long way to go.

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