"Have we lost our collective minds? Yes.
You may not be one of them. In fact, I’m guessing the people who actually take the time to read my blog posts are the few remaining who haven’t been subsumed by the panic, but can we agree that most have? Jeffrey A. Tucker of the American Institute for Economic Research put it best in his excellent essay on July 10 titled, When will the Madness End?:
“I’m a practicing psychiatrist who specializes in anxiety disorders, paranoid delusions, and irrational fear. I’ve been treating this in individuals as a specialist. It’s hard enough to contain these problems in normal times. What’s happening now is a spread of this serious medical condition to the whole population. It can happen with anything but here we see a primal fear of disease turning into mass panic. It seems almost deliberate. It is tragic. Once this starts, it could take years to repair the psychological damage.”"
https://jbhandleyblog.com/home/2020/7/27/lockdownlunacythree
pl
Sir,
This is the most cogent explanation I have read and I fully buy it.
Will the politicians and the media that drove the hysteria that crashed our small & mid-size business economy and provided the opportunity for the Fed to transfer trillions to the Party of Davos, ever be held to account? Nah! In contemporary America the grifters always laugh all the way to the bank.
There’s really no telling yet what the long term mental health of children wearing masks at school will bring. Will they be going into schools completely afraid they are going to die. One teacher has put up gravestones, ala Halloween, that read, “5 year old Johnny died here of Covid19”. Are teachers fearful, I believe if they are it will be picked-up on by the students. How will these children know if someone is smiling at them or scowling? Will there be fights breaking out, I kinda think so.
I’d say 40% of my peers (older, retired in Florida) are doing their best to live normally. the rest are living in fear and helping enormously to destroy our local economy. When they finally come out of hiding they’ll probably wonder why their favorite restaurant is no more. Eff them!
It is deliberate! LOL
“It seems almost deliberate.”
Colonel
I understand that generating a threat perception out of all proportion to the real threat is within your personal, professional experience. At some point I look forward very much to reading all about it.
For the conspiracy minded it is easy to think of reasons why some malign power may have introduced this virus in order to deliberately engender panic. Perhaps.
In the absence of any hard evidence for this I currently tend towards an explanation which does not require an evil mastermind – it is simply a mass delusion enhanced by the media and those politicians who find it useful. As Jeffrey Tucker says “This is the most politicized disease in history..”. I’ll defer to the historians to argue over that assertion, but it is definitely valid to ask how different the reaction would have been had we not been in a period of Deep State interregnum.
In some ways this is an even more alarming hypothesis, as it reinforces Nietzsche’s famous observation on group insanity.
Ha ha, in your face limeys with your 7% estimation.
Unfortunately the ‘rona is just one of many symptoms of widespread irrational fear. It is the root cause that is the real danger. I recently saw Pelosi describe Republicans as domestic “enemies of the state” and Hillary say that “Joe Biden should not concede under any circumstances”. Yes, TDS-20 is the real killer and the damage it may yet cause will be much more than just psychological.
Barbara Ann
“It seems almost deliberate.” Who re you quoting, certainly not me. You expect to read of me manipulating American public opinion? You will have a long wait. I never did any of that. I saw it happen at the hands of both political parties here but not me. I would consider that to be dishonorable. i have tried to live better than that.
My first paragraph was a reference to your time in VN as a GB and to your forthcoming memoir Colonel, I should have made that clear.
Effinghell
Yes, it is. It must be. Taking a “back azimuth” on the detailed wave after wave of political agitprop directed at Trump since 2016, I derive the opinion as I have said before that there is an operation room out there, probably in the New York City area where this very effective campaign has been planned and supervised. Whose money? There is a lot of lefty money out there in very rich hands, a lot of it among the vainglorious fops on Wall Street. Fort Brooklyn reborn?
Barbara Ann
I did not manipulate the South Vietnamese government. I fought to defend them. OTOH I would have been glad to make or participate in a full blooded attempt to bring down the Communist government in the north but the ass, LBJ, forbade us to do more than annoy them.
But your Montagnard guerillas did have the NVA running around thinking the enemy force was far larger than it actually was – that was the enhanced threat perception I was referring to from your GB days, Sir, not psyops against the government.
PBS recently did a very powerful special on the public costs required to care for the growing numbers of aging baby-boomers with dementia. Covid. Cui bono? Keeps more tax dollars for the living.
Hmmmmmmm………….. but we do need to grapple with this issue -when life becomes a technological holding tank- not yet on artificial life support systems, but in a bed ridden vegetative state. The dark side of “free health care”.
Barbara Ann
You have a strange romantic view of what happened. Enemy intelligence was extremely good. They knew exactly how many American, Korean, Thai, and all the different kinds of anticommunist forces that there were. They had human agents in every town. Often they worked as civilians for our side in logistics, kitchens, as drivers, etc. and their SIGINT was superb. They had a network of 2 watt manual Morse radios operating across the land from underground (literally) NVA radio stations. These operated off the ground lobe of the signal, and were virtually undetectable. They could pass traffic from the Saigon area to Hanoi in a couple of hours. These were NOT simple little brown people.
Col,
I believe Mr. Handley is correct, this sure looks like a deliberate and well co-ordinated action. In addition to the lefty money against Trump I would posit the Chinese, who spread this deliberately and are at the very least are taking advantage of the agitprop opportunities available. Trump’s trade efforts are the first pushback they’ve had in decades and their own economy is going to be on edge as a result. Those internationalist who staked too much on the Far East have to be desperate as well.
This latest blow up of Corona panic plus the newest BLM riot coincides with two things:
First, the failings of the Biden boondogle of a convention, with former prosecutor, mass incarcerator and racial cameleon Kamala Harris as the newest entrant into the limelight (Even the RNC convention had real people in the audience and by some reports 600% more viewership for day 1).
Second, Friday’s Brennan interview at CIA HQ. It looks like lots of Russia collusion plotting chickens are coming home to roost and the guilty parties have decided to fire up their base/agitprop works before Farmer Barr (symbolicly) wrings their necks by bringing indictments. Even their press corps operatives can’t hide those.
Funny…I’m not hysterical…I’ve been camping for 2 months all over the west! So many families out enjoying themselves safely in nature.
Don’t panic…put on your mask, gloves when needed, bring your sanitizer and LIVE!
“These were NOT simple little brown people.” So very true.
Why did we fight them as if they were only simple brown people?
Fred re. “Chinese, who spread this deliberately”
Based on what? I have seen no evidence to support this statement – unless you have some thing concrete you would like to share.
Alex Berensen’s recent (very short) book chapter is a must read: “Part 2: Update and Examination of Lockdowns as a Strategy” – devastating critique of lockdowns. Very clear and careful analysis.
Amazon attempted to kill his book’s first chapter, but Elon Musk found out about this from Berensen’s Twitter feed and with one “Tweet” Amazon backed off…
CK
Yes we did. We assumed that they were the SLBP of legend. We were wrong. To amplify on my previous remark about their SIGINT. Until early 1969 our field tactical radios had no built in crypto capability. The enemy had a country wide network of field signals collection posts in underground tunnel posts along with their barracks, hospitals, headquarters, etc. With these collection posts they collected the voice traffic of troops on our side and passed it on the 2 watt manual Morse network I mentioned before to their analytic centers and even to Hanoi in relays.
As a result they often knew exactly where and in what strength our field operations would be. Impressive.
JJackson, The outbreak began in the city of Wuhan China. The virus broke prior to Chinese New Year’s celebrations. The Chinese authorities disallowed Wuhan’s citizens from travelling within China but allowed international travel from Wuhan. As an example, 26,000 Wuhan residents descended upon Bangkok for the celebrations. Tons of Wuhan residents visited the usual European and American tourist spots.
For the record Colonel, my comment was intended to be read as a complement of your soldiering ability, not as a disparagement of your worthy foemen. Your writings here have made it very clear that the enemy were the antithesis of the SLBP stereotype. Anyway, I have strayed out of my lane and will say no more on the subject until I have read “Tattoo”.
Barbara Anne
Sorry about my sensitivity on some subjects. The idea that we fought an army of ill armed but enthusiastic peasants is a construct of the left in support of their VC heroes. Good IO work. In addition to having had much experience of these enemies in the fighting part of the war, I was there during the 4 power supervised truce at the end when the lions sat down together at the USAF officers’ club at Tan Son Nhut to see “the other guys.” In addition to the 4 power observers, VC and NVA officers of senior rank came to town. I spent a lot of time talking to them. they were pretty free with their speech at this moment of their impending victory. Good soldiers. We should have backed them in 1945, but we needed to keep France “on side” and so made a bad mistake.
Laura Wilson,
“when needed”
That would be almost never, especially outside camping.
I look forward to reading all about it. And I think you’ll be surprised at the size of the potential readership for your memoirs Colonel, you have “been there” at a great many of the important episodes in the recent history of US foreign policy.
Bill.
Not banning international flights is a far cry from spreading this deliberately, given what was know about the virus at the time. China can do what it likes internally but blocking international travel without guidance to do so under the IHR(2005) agreed terms is a different matter. I can not imagine the stink the US, and others, would have kicked up if they had banned travel, trapping their citizens in Wuhan, given the guidance issued on the 24th.
“WHO advises against the application of any restrictions of international traffic based on the information currently available on this event.” – 24th Jan.
Not that it would have made any difference anyway as it was out of China and spreading well before anyway.
Barbara Ann
The government took a lot out but there is still a lot. This is about how I became so there is a lot of stuff about family and upbringing that you may not find interesting.
I agree with what Laura posted. My family and I take precautions but we are hardly panicked. As a 73 year old I believe the responsibility to play it safe rests with me not with young people. I don’t expect them to care about me so I watch out for myself. This includes wearing a mask, staying away from large groups, washing my hands, etc. None of these precautions are difficult. We still socialize but do so with others who think like us.
“We should have backed them in 1945, but we needed to keep France “on side” and so made a bad mistake.”
Sir,
If and when you have the inclination would you please share your views on the domestic politics and the brain trust in our government that drove us to initially support De Gaulle’s recolonization of IndoChina, and the mission creep that ended with our direct involvement in military conflict.
I recall the vigorous discussions between my dear Dad and his siblings around Truman’s decision to support French ambitions. They were dead against it even accepting De Gaulle’s threat to align with Stalin.
NancyK
So, you remain convinced that COVID-19 really is the Black Plague and that the economy must be kept shut down until your side wins.
jack
Clearly the Deep State bureaucracy in both State and the War Department were very Eurocentric and couldn’t get their minds around the idea of not backing the French against the little brown people. At the same time the clear intention of the USSR to take as much of Europe as possible made it necessary to support a non-Communist France. The Vietminh were very friendly to us immediately after WW2 and people like Wedemeyer and FDR wanted to reciprocate but the forces of the DS bullied them into what amounted to a pro-colonial policy which I among so many others came to regret bitterly, and still do. Hell, Uncle Ho offered us a naval base at Cam Ranh Bay.
JJackson, Well, President Trump agrees with me as well as the Government of Thailand, I suspect Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia also concur. The CCP knew an epidemic was raging in Wuhan but let Chinese New Year’s revelers travel in the 10s of thousands to popular tourist destinations. The second big outbreak was in Italy in an area where Chinese workers are numerous. It’s also where a lot of Chinese “Partyers” were travelling to and fro. I don’t know if you travel much but prior to the outbreak there were numerous (too numerous to count actually) Chinese package tour groups all over the world in the tourist hot spots. It was fun watching them in Prague and other places, there would be 30-50 a group and they were obviously more peasant than urbanite.
The Thai government for years targeted their tourist marketing campaign towards the Chinese. They will not do so in the future. They do not want them, period.
In Massachusetts, as of Aug. 25, 2020, COVID-19 deaths, for now, attributed to this = 8,959.
Of these, there = 4,578 “from deaths following completed investigation.”
Of this number, exactly 81 deaths are those with “no underlying condition.”
https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-august-25-2020/download
-30-
Colonel,
I can’t wait to read Tattoo. Please let us know as soon as it’s available.
Colonel
Was the VC expertise in radio interception and low power transmission systems developed by themselves or with Russian and/or Chinese help?
Were similar techniques in use by the WP in Europe, perhaps after their success in Vietnam?
JohninMK
IMO the Viets worked this out for themselves during the French war. the techniques and equipment are like nothing that ever appeared in the WP pact area. The communist Vietnamese are formidable. They were foemen worthy of our steel.