- Re: James Corbett on the pandemic (or 'pandemic', if you prefer) - Archived Message
Posted by brooks
on March 2, 2020, 1:02 pm, in reply to "Re: James Corbett on the pandemic (or 'pandemic', if you prefer) -"
| Mary that's an important point that Corbett doesn't mention. 40 years of neoliberalism and the gutting of public institutions have made governments singularly incapable of meeting their populations' basic needs, let alone responding to a public health emergency. The massive shift of wealth upwards to the the billionaire class and its appendages have left the vast majority of people - many of whom were already facing health and financial crises - public health systems and the highly integrated world economy totally exposed to a pandemic. Also Corbett's inane, repeated comment about “whether [coronavirus] even really exists” – contradicted by his comment that “it quite clearly meet[s] the criteria” of a pandemic - indicate either confusion or sops for his tinfoil-hat readers. Still he puts this into an important context of economic collapse and the potential escalation in authoritarianism - including a crackdown on the internet - that are likely real and disturbing possibilities. Whatever happens, it's not going to be pretty. |