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P A N D E M IC

PANDEMONIUM

This is the event that was waiting to happen, like an earthquake. Some were prepared: South Korea and Germany, for instance, which are capitalist societies, yet regulated. They understood the risk and invested appropriately in provision for public health.

Unlike Italy, Spain, the US and UK, a few countries were at least partially prepared. According to a commentator who worked on a simulation in 2016, the UK knew the risk of a pandemic and how to prepare. Despite this the Tory government chose to ignore advice. They decided to save money by not paying the 'insurance' that could save many thousands of lives... and now the house has come down!

Presumably, the government and their Tory 'expert' advisers estimated that the well-heeled, who they actually represent, would somehow be immune. They were right: there's less of them, so fewer as a proportion would be affected; and because they generally enjoy a more affluent, easier lifestyle, they're both healthier and more able to protect themselves.

So while Germany have been investing for years in 6x the hospital provision per person than the UK, including Intensive Care and protective equipment, and South Korea had full stores of testing kits and everything else needed in the event of a pandemic, the Tories knew better!

In January when Germany, South Korea, China and others instigated mass testing and isolation, the UK - despite having failed to establish stores of equipment and contingency plans as advised from the 2016 simulation - made no attempt to acquire testing or protective gear or even warn the public. Instead the government advised people to prepare themselves for losing frail loved-ones to the virus - adding that the virus would be allowed to spread so that a herd-immunity would eventually protect everyone who survived.

Now, finally, in April, two months late and after an 'alarming' increase in death rates (that were entirely predictable from what was happening elsewhere)... and when still even NHS staff haven't been tested because of the lack of kits... the government announces that mass testing is after all to be set-up. They say: "as swiftly as possible", they say "We are organising the acquisition of protective equipment such as masks, aprons, gloves, etc."

Yet, amazingly, even now labs and suppliers of various equipment around the country are reporting that no-one has attempted to contact them or made any requests for assistance. So the government continue failing to procure what NHS staff are declaring they still don't have.

Most if not all those deaths in February and March could have been avoided if only the government had followed 'outside' advice and instigated mass testing in January. Or better, had been properly prepared (like Germany and South Korea) as it was their job as government to do.

None of this is a surprise to me. For at least the past decade, the UK government has been run by spivs and sharks and their toady Tory advisers. Like a new angle on 'group-think', their interest, their mandate, was to spend as little as possible on public services, keep the poorest firmly in place and enslaved if possible - hence no rent-regulation leading to high rents, continued 'austerity' with low income from 'universal credit' leading to rough-sleeping, food-banks.... and all to support, essentially, a population of affluent rip-off 'speculators'...

"...and so it appears that all these five blocks of buildings are at work, and inferior cotton is sold in the Eastern markets, simply that Christina Dmitryevna may eat sterlet and drink Madeira."

From 'A Doctor's Visit' by Chekhov

Now with the pandemic, millions more will require 'universal credit', which is barely enough to survive on. Yet a colossal £360bn has been promised to bail-out businesses... when business makes £bns in profit, they keep it - when they make a loss, government bails them out... as the banks discovered back in 2008.

Why were banks not made to repay the bail-out before subsequently shelling-out £bns in profits to speculators as they did? What could be more obvious than Tory government represents speculators above all.

Clearly, instead of dishing-out vast sums to business, or to certain qualified claimants, a generous universal income for everyone would be the only sensible policy, together with a new progressive tax system to recover any allowances back from the wealthy plus what they continually cream from the system. That way, everyone - not just the wealthy - can enjoy a decent standard of living, or as near to it as possible.

This can never happen while Tory 'speculators' are running the country. It would offend their criminally hierarchical 'greatest-riches-for-the-shrewdest' jungle philosophy on how society should operate.

* * * * *

Apart from the tragedy of individual deaths, though, there are many positive consequences of the pandemic.

It is the wealthiest and most powerful people and organisations who are behind virtually all that is destroying the world. It is they who drive the hectic rat-race of endless wealth-seeking and growth, incessant striving for more: more production and consumption of whatever anyone can invent or create, however harmful to the environment or its consumers... all this insane activity that is purely so spivs/speculators can make money as they exploit and despoil with impunity.

Much of that has now paused... and what a fabulous respite for the natural world, as well as millions of 'slaves'... except now with no income the 'slaves' have become secondary victims (after those infected by the virus).

But the environmental gains are enormous... and so could be (with political will and pressures as a consequence of the pandemic) social changes/advances in the wake of the pandemic...

It's therefore essential to do everything possible to prevent the re-assertion of the spivs and sharks, the psychopaths who've been running and ruining the UK (and much of the world) for so long, causing poverty and misery to many millions of people who've been forced to live on or below the breadline.... usually those who's work actually creates the wealth. This is a great opportunity to halt the continual theft of that wealth, and for a peaceful revolution in politics and in how society functions, a revolution that if enacted around the world could save the planet from the worst effects of climate change and improve the lifestyle of millions.

 

A NOTE ON THE 'ECONOMY'

What the media call the 'Economy' is actually the status quo. So far, during this 'lockdown', the normal everyday systems that keeps the world running has operated fine. Which goes to prove that a vast amount of human activity is superfluous. Who needs a hundred different kinds of shampoo? Who REALLY needs to get from London to New York in a few hours?

Most maintenance, development and making of useful products and systems is currently on hold and will at some point need attending to; while essential activities like fuel & food production and logistics, plus health and social services, have to be kept running regardless.

And while health and social care are free in the UK, everyone, working or idle, needs an income so they can buy fuel and food.

Government should therefore provide a 'universal-income' - say ~£2,000/month per person - immediately. Few other costs exist if rents and mortgages and other loans are suspended - landlords don't need rent when they receive 'universal-income' like everyone else. This should have begun in January together with mass-testing for the virus.

As for government money, wherever they borrow from to fund 'universal-income', health and social services etc., would ultimately forfeit the loan... who lends to governments? Only the rich... like banks, billionaires... who else?

THIS is a GREAT opportunity for a total CORRECTION in the whole international economy and monetary system. When the lockdown ends and everything returns to normal, ALL loans, ALL delays, ALL costs should reset... to ZERO... as if the first and last day of lockdown was the same day... as if, in fact, time vanished.

No-one will lose except wealthy organisations and people who are already loaded by virtue of a corrupt system.

What kind of society allows an individual or organisation.... who makes mobile phones, runs a website, plays great football, or has outstanding musical or other talent... to become billionaires...???.. or even multi-millionaires?

What kind of society allows anyone who does ANYTHING to become so stupendously rich... unless, maybe, they are a great surgeon who saves many lives.

Ask yourself: where do those vast sums of money come from? Unless a government prints it - every penny/cent owned by billionaires and banks has been stolen from the poor. Follow the money.... follow it back and you'll see it comes from nowhere else but millions of small sums extorted from the poorest. Only a twisted system run by charlatans allows such perpetual and extensive theft from millions of people so they can be kept enslaved, in debt.

So government policy needs a massive re-set to correct this insane situation. The economy will be fine when the pandemic finally ends - in fact, vastly improved - with government debts cancelled and policies reset to at least significantly reduce the extent of theft.

Predicted economic turmoil and recession, is like the 'millennium bug' scare: a fabrication of the billionaires and banks and their flunkeys (right-wing politicians) to frighten us and 'justify' continuation of their rip-off system that keeps them in power.

* * * * *

Why are charities, as announced on the news today (6th April), being set-up to collect money for the NHS? What is the purpose of this government? Why is it continually failing so abysmally... of course: spivs and sharks... like double-glazing and second-hand car salesmen, they have no skills for anything except in conning the gullible... what's most astonishing to me is how so many people accept this without question. It's like we live in a nation of morons.

What a MONUMENTAL farce!

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