George Rebane

Proposition:  Many more lives will be lost and/or ruined by intentionally tanking our economy into a depression, than will be lost to Covid19 going forward with a balanced policy of social distancing and continuing our economic pursuits with due prudence during the waning epidemic.

The iconic and immortal Jack Benny, comic of a bygone era known for portraying a skinflint, performed that classic skit where a robber walks up with a gun and demands, ‘Your money or your life!’.  Benny takes time to react and looks absorbed, prompting the thug to demand ‘Well?!’ to which Jack replies, ‘I’m thinking, I’m thinking.’

At Casa Rebane we are now in HD13 – our 13^th day of hunkering down which began on 8 March.  We are in the so-called most vulnerable age group, even though we are both still healthy, which at our ages can change overnight.  Given this, and the many birthdays under our belts, both of us have had much talk about what direction the country should take going forward.  The alternatives seem to be –

1. Everyone hunkers down, leave home only for the necessaries of life, businesses shut down, millions of jobs are permanently lost, government prints and distributes tons of cash to everyone (with dire fiscal consequences), the morbidity and mortality curves are flattened, and if all ‘goes well’ we emerge losing fewer lives to Covid19 and then dive into a genuine global depression taking years to recover, during which many more (millions) of uncounted lives are lost to poverty and perhaps real war, and more millions of lives are consigned to various stages of destitution.
2. Quickly learn how to manage infection risks with social distancing etc, and go on with prudently modified business practices while preventive medicines/vaccines are discovered and treatments developed to minimize the inevitable morbidity and mortality rates which will rise and take from the oldest and weakest among us. But in doing so keep the wheels of business and industry turning so that we don’t become a second or third world country with the potential for real civil unrest that will inevitably rise from our great and chronic socio-political divisions.

Rebane Doctrine calls for taking #2 as the wisest and best approach.  Executing such a well-considered and purposeful plan forward will allow us to emerge economically strong, and most certainly wiser about how to manage our affairs in preparation for the next pandemic (Covid19 is NOT the last one we will encounter).  And showing leadership with #2 will allow us to set an example to the rest of the world and support them in taking their own prudent risks and cope with small to moderate losses.

If our national measure of utility is to reduce the number of premature deaths over, say, the next five years, then it’s a no-brainer to avoid #1.  So while you are doing your own thinking, consider that no poor and destitute country has ever been able to take care of its own, let alone help others and contribute to preserving the environment and providing a satisfying quality of life for its citizens.  Fearfully hunkering down will guarantee that we will suffer such a dreadful future, in short America opting for #1 will be penny wise and pound foolish.

I am reminded of the encouraging words of Sgt Dan Daly, the holder of two Medals of Honor at Bellau Wood, “Come on you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?!”

[21mar20 update]  ‘Low Wage Workers Face Brunt of Coronavirus Crisis’ (here) is one of the many news articles explaining to us the obvious – it was ever thus.  Yet these low- and mid-wage workers are continuously pandered to about the feds bailing out Wall Street capitalists and greedy corporations.  They don’t grasp that giving money only to such workers will not help, for they will have nowhere to spend it for their necessaries – if only the grassroots libs would attempt to think about that.  But they don’t; they don’t comprehend that the low- and mid-wage workers don’t create jobs, instead, they benefit from having jobs.

It is America’s business owners and investors who create and sustain the companies, and take the risks to make the stuff we need while creating the jobs that make our quality of life possible – it is called capitalism.  But today, one of our political parties and its academia, media and entertainment industry allies are doing everything possible (including crisis enhancement) to convince Americans that government can do it all much better than the private sector – they take pride in being called socialists and communists.