Kinzinger steps down – The billionaires’ protests – Lewis on Pride – Vaccines vs. natural immunity – The shrewdness of Glenn Youngkin – The issue of education in Virginia – Pfizer authorized for young children – Evening statistics
Adam Kinzinger has announced that he will not seek re-election for his position in the House of Representatives. Such a decision is not unexpected, for he has undergone an extremely frustrating experience during the last several months. He has been consistently maligned for his resolute opposition to Donald Trump’s baneful influence on both the Republican party and the national political scene generally, not only by his own party but – what must be still more bitter for him – by his own church. But it is unfortunate all the same; with his departure, the Republican Party is deprived of one of the few voices of reason it has left and as a result is more firmly than ever in the hands of Trump’s flunkies. Trump is clearly gratified by the news. “Two down, eight to go!” was his exultant response – alluding to the decision of Anthony Gonzalez, another Republican to vote for the second impeachment, not to seek re-election. Kinzinger has stated that he will continue work for Country First, a political action committee he founded for the purpose of combatting Trump’s grip on the Republican Party. One can only wish him well, though I personally see little chance of his succeeding.
Various billionaires are protesting vociferously to a proposed plan that would tax gains of people with either $1 billion or more in assets or three consecutive years of income of $100 million or more. It would apply to fewer than about 800 people, who would have to pay tax on the value of tradable items, such as stocks, even if they don’t sell them. Under current law, such assets are subject to tax only when they’re sold. The unenlightened public may be surprised at the intensity of their objections: why should it matter to Elon Musk, for instance, if his personal fortune is $250 billion instead of $300 billion (the amount of his current estimated wealth). What they do not realize is that people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos cling to money with the fervor that Romeo bestowed upon Juliet; it is the essence of their being, without they would become forlorn shadows of their former selves; they regard it with the protective attitude of a mother towards her infant child, and pennies and farthings remain clutched in their grasp under circumstances that would have driven them abruptly from less devoted hands.
C. S. Lewis makes the point in “Mere Christianity” that of the seven deadly sins, pride is the most harmful. As an example, he instances attitudes such as these being the result of pride rather than avarice. “Greed will certainly make a man want money, for the sake of a better house, better holidays, better things to eat and drink. But only up to a point. What is it that makes a man with £10,000 a year anxious to get £20,000 a year? It is not the greed for more pleasure. £10,000 will give all the luxuries that any man can really enjoy. It is Pride—the wish to be richer than some other rich man, and (still more) the wish for power. For, of course, power is what Pride really enjoys: there is nothing makes a man feel so superior to others as being able to move them about like toy soldiers.” Musk himself bears out this assertion. He claims to base his objections not on the basis of greed but on the assumption that he can put his money to much better use than the U.S. government is capable of doing: “My plan,” he tweeted yesterday, “is to use the money to get humanity to Mars and preserve the light of consciousness.” If he is not an embodiment of the deadly sin of Pride, I don’t know what is.
A study by the CDC has found that vaccines confer a higher rate of immunity from the virus than previous infection does. This, of course, is not conclusive – the CDC, after all, has consistently recommended vaccines from the onset and thus has a vested interest in seeing such a recommendation justified – but it is it, any rate, suggestive. The study examined 7,000 people hospitalized with COVID-like illnesses, and found that those who were unvaccinated — but had a previous case of the illness — were five times more likely to have a confirmed case of COVID than people who were fully vaccinated and had not had COVID before. Deepta Bhattacharya, a professor of immunology at the University of Arizona, cautioned such a comparison does not address the main issue. “The reason to prefer vaccine-induced immunity is that infections can make you really sick, not that they don’t leave you immune.” And, as I pointed out in an earlier entry, the aftermath of such infections can be severe, even after the original infections have disappeared.
I am bound to admit that Glenn Youngkin has displayed a certain shrewdness in the gubernatorial race. He cannot say outright that he doesn’t want Trump meddling in his campaign – that would alienate the numerous Trump supporters in the rural areas of the state. At the same time he cannot afford to be seen as Trump’s puppet, which would forfeit the loyalty of almost every independent and even some Republicans in Northern Virginia, the most heavily populated area. So he has kept all outside Republican celebrities at a distance, including Trump himself, and has invited none of them to his rallies. Trump, of course, is not easily kept away when he has a mind to be involved. He intends to hold a tele-rally on Youngkin’s behalf. But it will take place on Monday, the day before the election, and it is not likely to have much effect at that late date.
The issue that has become the central focus of the Virginia election is education. McAuliffe is decidedly showing to disadvantage here. “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they need to teach,” he said recently – quite maladroitly. Parents certainly have a legitimate concern about the curriculum being taught to their children. Youngkin, on the other hand, has won the confidence of many parents by denouncing the pornographic content of certain books various school boards and the compulsory teaching of critical race theory, and with that I am in thorough agreement. Critical race theory, as it now stands, is political indoctrination. It is one thing to teach about the horrific living conditions imposed by slavery and the Jim Crow laws, and the heroic struggles of figures such as Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Charlotte Fortin, Booker T. Washington, Ralph Bunche, Martin Luther King, and numerous others to overcome them; it is quite another to mislead students into believing that these are the totality of American history.
The Pfizer vaccine has now been authorized for children in the 5-11 age range. Officially the nation’s vaccination rate is 57.8% but this figure is for people of all ages. The actual figure of those eligible for vaccination up to this point – that is to say, everyone aged 12 and older – is 67.7%. It appears likely that the national vaccination as a whole will increase substantially now that younger children may receive at least one of the available vaccines.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 246,719,184; # of deaths worldwide: 5,003,850; # of cases U.S.: 46,765,347; # of deaths; U.S.: 765,645. Despite the recent declines in cases, we have reached an undesirable milestone: the global death count is now over 5 million.