In the 1967 movie, “Cool Hand Luke,” the prison warden (veteran character actor Strother Martin) announces savagely to Luke (Paul Newman) and fellow chain gang convicts, “What we’ve got here is ‘failure to communicate.’” We see today a similar landscape where our president’s least accomplished trait is communication. Try as he may, the “very stable genius” is unable to connect with the majority of the populace he ostensibly represents. He is a study in “failure to communicate.”
The 1992 presidential election featured the winning message, “It’s the economy, stupid.” Fix the economy and everything else will fall into place. Those were salad days for the very stable genius as private citizen. Now he and his minions seem to be resurrecting that slogan as a corollary of MAGA. Missing is the context that 1992’s predominant domestic problem was a struggling economy, unchallenged by other major worries, certainly not by a worldwide pandemic.
Now the economy is not our primary threat. This in no way denies its supreme importance to most workers and business owners. The reality is, the current recession-approaching-depression is a result of the coronavirus, not the other way around. Treating the economy will not cure Covid-19. Conversely, treating the pandemic will absolutely cure the economy. To refine the slogan, “It’s the disease, stupid.”
Even citizens who guard against governmental overreach admit: it has its place. Governments do things for our general welfare beyond the power of individuals or lesser groups. Protecting us is a Constitutional responsibility of federal government, which has been ignored at the direction and by example of the president.
The planned impeachment articles of Richard Nixon would have focused on a question from Republican Senator Howard Baker, “What did the president know, and when did he know it?” Today we know well, the current president ignored early evidence and reports from scientists of the impending severe epidemic. His administration has failed the Constitutional mandate to “promote the general Welfare.”
The very stable genius sees himself as victimized at every turn, most recently as he tries to cure Covid-19 by promoting open businesses. His job as communicator-in-chief is not rocket science. New York’s governor shows daily how to be successful: offer facts and honest descriptions of how government works for people. Skip the wishful happy-talk. What we have here is a failure to communicate. Americans want the truth. “It’s the disease.” Stupid.
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In other Indivisible Santa Barbara news, 1) we recently matched our member donations to United Way’s COVID-19 Joint Response Effort for a total donation of $1600. 2) National Indivisible has endorsed presidential candidate Joe Biden. ISB’s combined Steering and Advisory Committees concur with the national endorsement. We acknowledge a plurality of Santa Barbarans and Californians voted in the Democratic primary election for a different candidate. Nevertheless, we view a change in national administration to be crucial and encourage all Americans to support Mr. Biden.