Post-Election Reflection

My mantra over the past few months had been: Stupidity is the real pandemic.

With the election results last night, it’s never felt more true.

 As we’ve been huddled in our homes over the past eight months, tRump was crisscrossing the country leading superspreader events, generating an estimated 30,000 Covid cases and 700 deaths, according to a Stanford University study. This, despite his own Covid case, that of his wife and son, and numerous White House employees.

Notice the similarities?

Total cases (as of Nov. 3) resulting from his dereliction in managing the virus have hit 9.2 million and 232,000 deaths. The single day total topped 100,000 this week as well.     

That’s on track to only increase rapidly as winter sets in, people retreat indoors, and experience pandemic fatigue.

The economy has not recovered. Unemployment numbers are high, healthcare workers are burning out, people are experiencing food insecurity and fear of eviction, and schooling is compromised.

 

But that did not deter his cult from turning out to vote in favor of more of the same, fueled by tRump’s raging Twitter feed and the disinformation from Fox news. So it comes as no surprise that counties with the highest cases of Covid-19 voted for tRump, according to the Associated Press. The analysis reveals "that in 376 counties with the highest number of new cases per capita, the overwhelming majority — 93% of those counties — went for Trump, a rate above other less severely hit areas."

 

Why? It’s a question I’ve asked repeatedly since 2016 and despite all the analyses, there is no answer that satisfies me, other than sheer ignorance and stupidity. Add to that the utter corruption of almost everyone within spitting distance of him, and you have a recipe for polarization unlike anything we’ve seen in the country.

 

How to fix this? Two words: Rigorous education.

 

All of this stems from the dumbing down of America – a list of happenings too long to list here. Any remedy must start with the educational system – bring back civics, science, and history classes, and critical thinking – teach kids about the legislative process and the importance of voting, and how to distinguish facts from opinion, amid the blitz of social media posts and the 24/7 news cycle. More reading, less football. We need to build brain cells, not destroy them. 

 

So it's comforting that along with a newly elected competent, compassionate president, Joe Biden, we have his wife, Jill, who is an educator. 

Written by Dietrich Bonhoeffer shortly before
he was murdered by Adolph Hitler.