Otherwise known as The Simpsons nailing it again way back in 2010.

Just a few years after that show aired the US had the opportunity to experience the real thing. In 2009 there was a panic as the H1N1 virus cut through the US population. America ground to a halt. All planes were grounded while subways and buses stopped running. Highways emptied out as people stayed home. Schools closed, as well as restaurants, gyms, and supermarkets.

And not without reason. According to the CDC there were 60.8 million cases, 274,304 hospitalizations, and 12,469 deaths in the USA. People everywhere blamed President Obama for that historic tragedy.

Surely you all remember that?

Okay – I’m just kidding. Nothing at all like that happened despite those statistics, for the very good reason that it should not have.  So what’s different this time?

🤔

Well there’s a Republican President in office and his chances of being relected have been increasing with every passing month, especially as the Democrat Party has got closer to selecting as their candidate, Joe Bivalve Biden! With no major war and the economy cranking along the Democrats have looked increasingly like dead bivalves.


Until now. As far as the Democrats are concerned the economy will, with any luck, be crunched by this disease and as Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel once said “You should never let a serious crisis go to waste”.

And as leading example of that, the Biden campaign has apparently formed a “Public Health Advisory Committee”, which will presumably allow him to try and act all Presidential like.

I had so hoped they would name it The Committee of Public Safety, but I guess there’s at least some people with Biden who know their history.

Ezekiel Emanuel

And funnily enough the most well-known member of this group is none other than Tiny Dancer’s brother, bioethicist Ezekiel Emanuel, also known for being one of the architects of Obamacare.

Now what’s really funny about this is that a few years ago he decided to step into the shoes of his Biblical namesake and start making some pretty hairy prophecies of the future of humans, in an article that ran in The Atlantic.

He titled it, Why I Hope To Die At 75, and it has much juicy goodness to explore. Like this quote:

Here is a simple truth that many of us seem to resist: living too long is also a loss. It renders many of us, if not disabled, then faltering and declining, a state that may not be worse than death but is nonetheless deprived. It robs us of our creativity and ability to contribute to work, society, the world. It transforms how people experience us, relate to us, and, most important, remember us. We are no longer remembered as vibrant and engaged but as feeble, ineffectual, even pathetic.

Yowser!

Given who the primary victims of the coronavirus are I have to wonder if old Ezekiel is really going to be busting his braincells to stop it.

“a state that may not be worse than death”

And does he actually know whose campaign he has joined? Does he have any other… personal… advice for the candidate?

Is this all part of the Democrat plan to select a Vice-Presidential candidate with chops who can step into the Big Shoes early in 2021?

For that matter, does Joe know who he has advising him? This is the Ides of March in the USA as I write, and Ezekiel certainly has a lean and hungry look about him, as well as thinking too much.

All politicians know to watch their back if they’re to avoid having a sharp dagger sunk into it, but if I was Joe I’d be watching with extra care today and from here on.