This Pandemic Will Change Us. We Just Don’t Know Quite How Yet.

Looking back at the Black Death can give us a few clues, though.

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Dear Reader (including those of you who might get a literal Get Out of Jail Free card from Bill de Blasio),

When World War II was just gearing up, the British were ill-prepared. They couldn’t just wait for factories—at home or in America—to start churning out the arsenal of democracy. They had to get ready with whatever was on hand. To that end, they de-mothballed some light field artillery last used during the Boer War and assembled the five-man crew required to fire it. But when they drilled with the equipment there was something not quite right. According to procedure, three seconds before discharging the weapon, two of the men would stand at attention off to the side and hold position until after the shot was fired. No one knew why they did that. Ultimately, they had to call in an old retired artillery officer. 

He watched the exercise for a while, and then a spark of an old memory struck and he recognized what they were doing: “I have it. They are holding the horses.” 

They could tell the choreography didn’t make sense, but (like Chesterton’s fence) they couldn’t quite figure out why it was required.  

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  1. Avatar photo
    Greg Zorbach

    Not really a comment on this conversation, just an FYI for Jonah, re. letters of marque:
    https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2020/april/unleash-privateers?utm_source=U.S.+Naval+Institute&utm_campaign=5d171d15c8-Proceedings_This_Week__2020_1_23_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_adee2c2162-5d171d15c8-222727597&mc_cid=5d171d15c8&mc_eid=7dae79cc5d

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  2. Avatar photo
    Dina

    There are many welcome differences between the Black Death and coronavirus. One is a better understanding of hygiene and two is better medical care, among others, which make today's pandemic far less deadly (although this is not to minimize the frighteningly high and rapidly rising death toll). Another hugely welcome difference is that hundreds of Jewish communities will not be completely wiped out nor thousands of Jews murdered by angry hordes blaming the Jews for the plague.

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  3. John O Plumer

    My 40 something daughter's reposted Facebook comment: "Maybe with all our infighting of late, God has sent us all to our rooms."

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  4. John O Plumer

    Lincoln's " Dogmas of the quiet past " come to mind.

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    Jason

    I laughed heartily at the sneaking in of the 'underrated' there.

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  6. Richard Fulmer

    Inflation is a worry given all of the Feds machinations.

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  7. Avatar photo
    CynthiaW

    I was just looking at an article that said 41% of the people who have died from coronavirus in Louisiana had diabetes. Another 31% had chronic kidney disease. 28% were obese. Then there are COPD cases, heart conditions. Only 5%, according to the article, had no known pre-existing morbidity.

    Without getting too deep in the statistical weeds, I think it's safe to say that a vast number of the gravely-ill and dead had lifestyle-related vulnerabilities. What if we had a healthier population? What if the number of people needing long-term ICU care were cut in half because people hadn't smoked, because they had adopted healthy eating and exercise habits? The situation we're facing today (Saturday, March 28) would be very different.

    Going forward, will we see self-directed change in people's lifestyles as they confront the possibility of regular waves of Covid-19 infection? Will we see more municipalities and states passing laws such as NYC's Big Gulp ban? What about medical-care rationing based on lifestyle-related factors. Did I read that the UK rations surgery for the obese? (It might have been just a proposal.)

    I know it's just crazy talk, but is there a possibility that the Federal government would stop *subsidizing* the tobacco industry, the HFCS industry, and so on? When the next wave of infections hits ... this winter, next spring? ... will we still be saying that marijuana, tobacco and vaping shops are "essential businesses"?

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    1. Avatar photo
      Rick Harlan

      The only way I could see to get that many people healthier would be if our governments took drastic measures to get people out of bars and restaurants, and start eating meals they cook at home.

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  8. Avatar photo
    GREG BROWN

    The retrospective (if there is one) may drive home how much our lawsuit culture has driven out common sense and made it almost impossible to get anything done efficiently

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    1. Avatar photo
      CynthiaW

      Excellent observation, Greg Brown.

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  9. A.J. Nolte

    This is the first thing I've read in a while that's close to where my head is right now; I thought I was the only person thinking about this stuff, rather than examining the entrails of every presidential press conference for smoking guns or treasured pearls of wisdom respectively.

    Being Americans, we'll probably do something paradoxical, like start demanding UBI and caring about the debt at the same time. My inner optimist hopes we'll start valuing work-horse, rather than show-horse, politicians. Of course, my inner optimist is usually wrong, though we might start valuing the appearance of being a work-horse not a show-horse for an election cycle or two.

    Mostly, though, it'll be culture that changes, and that's all but impossible to predict.

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  10. Herb Mitchell

    Trillion is the New Billion
    We started naming snow storms in 2012,
    people are being called racists while,
    fighting over the name of the worst pandemic ever now,
    you are 100% correct about spraying water on a burning house,
    then turning off the spigot after the fire is out.

    If this is the bar we're gonna use,
    for shutting the country down,
    and borrowing against our children's futures, cliche but true,
    which direction does the bar go next time, even if the worst ever pandemic numbers don't pan out.

    I know we have instituted measures,
    to keep the number of infected people down,
    I'm pretty sure eight of the ten richest counties,
    have Washington DC surrounded,
    we are never even going to attempt,
    to move toward a balanced budget I don't think,
    we are a country addicted to deficits,
    keep on spending darling what's in it for me,
    exactly what the founding fathers feared.

    Like the 3 Stooges wadding up a 50,
    when counting 100 dollar bills,
    before diving on it after realizing,
    what they had done,
    spending is on steroids even during,
    the greatest all time two point five percent growth rate,
    trillion is the new billion and our,
    fiscally irresponsible government,
    during these reasonably peaceful,
    and prosperous times,
    cannot be bothered with recognizing,
    or batting a responsible eye.

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    1. Avatar photo
      CynthiaW

      Evocative!

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