indeterminacy

"We had no such thing as printed newspapers in those days to spread rumours and reports of things, and to improve them by the invention of men, as I have lived to see practised since." daniel defoe. "a journal of the plague year"

you can see fear in the faces of people..it is palpable...and the media have done yeoman's work in instilling it...probably even when they are trying to be factual rather than craft a product for a core viewership that then consumes whatever their advertisers are hawking...mostly because the facts are scary and there seems to be a facet of the population that likes to be frightened...if not, why all the slasher/crime garbage in film and that sump of a media, television...i am not a pundit or an astrologer or a prognosticator...i do have questions and have to wonder what this distortion will do to the political landscape...the president is trying to mitigate his inability to refrain from saying whatever pops into his head in an unfiltered manner by sending his past comments down the memory hole...this is unsurprising...how many people are going to swallow that and, if disbelief is widespread will that make a political difference...or more of a political difference than passing out $850 billion ( most of which will go to corporate structures ) including, from what i have read, $50 billion for disbursement to the hoi polloi which may render trumpy's obfuscation irrelevant in many eyes...and you have to wonder how long the system can run on simple belief before the facts insist on a massive "correction"...according to the treasury department the outstanding public debt in terms of principle and interest is running at $23,475,000,000,000 and change...which is 107% of the gdp...a debtor nation no matter how you break down the numbers...so $850 billion more is coals to newcastle since it is all running on the belief that somehow this can all be paid for when it is patently obvious it will not...or, at least, not without pauperizing the nation...the national debt clock says my personal share is $72,584...unfortunate...perhaps disabusing me of the notion that since i have no credit card debt and own the home free and clear ( aside from property taxes..non-payment of which can result in the seizure of my hard won home...seems even after paying off the mortgage i am renting from the county...the extraction goes on and on ) i am debt free...seems a chimera...a myth...like the rest of the beliefs we hold fostered by the hegemonic culture...covid-19 is exposing some of the liabilities and shortcomings of the "system"...one wonders how long they can continue to throw money at it ( in supremely un-republican fashion )...and this doesn't even consider what impact climate change may have on other disease gradients...what if ebola gets loose here? how many pandemics can the nation ( or the species ) survive in its "normal" form...in lock-downs and mandatory isolations/quarantines you can already perceive a creeping authoritarianism based on a utilitarian concept of the "greatest good for the greatest number"...where does the creeping stop? is this an altruistic government seeing to the needs/welfare of its people or the reichstag fire? i don't know...i am concerned...it would be a good cover story and "president for life" is not an unrealistic inference...fear distorts thought...renders it unsound...and we are chock full of that right now...i am on the first day of an enforced vacation because of it...covid-19 has reached this county...the future, in terms of politics, economics, and life itself seems up for grabs...how much responsibility for that can i realistically lay at the doorstep of the times and its media "colleagues"? and how much credit goes to "pangolin,it's what's for dinner" embedded in someone else's culture? it is all indeterminate to any specific degree since all seem to be participating...so i will keep washing my hands and wondering exactly how long this will go on and if "normal" is ever coming back.