Coronavirus, a Grim Teaching Moment in Economics and Religion
Anti abortion zealots, who refer to themselves as "pro life," resist all kinds of "end of life" measures that allow terminally ill people to die sooner or take their own lives when they choose to do so. Because their religious views include the myth that one fertilized cell is a human being it clouds their reasoning abilities and pushes them into a land of make believe.
Economics has always taught an undeniable fact, there are limited resources. There are limited and finite amounts of space, food, air, water or time. In the anti abortion make believe world all these resources are unlimited. It is never necessary for a human, or many humans, to die because the world's resources have been used up. They cannot admit resources are limited and the number of people who can live is also limited because that opens the door to women deciding how many children they can support. If they admit resources are limited women's abortions are justified.
Every day, perhaps thousands of times, respirators keeping terminally ill patients are quietly turned off and patients die. Patients request this before hand, as I have done, and family and doctors all agree. The misery of the patient is involved but also involved are the resources it take to keep these people alive.
Socialized medicine is involved in this debate because turning off respirators would be more transparent than it is today. There would be a written policy about which patients could keep living and which would die. Admitting resources require this decision makes anti abortion zealots really nervous. They would prefer to pretend there are no such decisions anywhere.
From what I am reading about the Coronavirus, it is possible, some say likely, the need for respirators to keep people alive will far outstrip the number available. This will force those in charge, including Catholic hospitals, to establish rules about who lives and who dies, the same choice pregnant women make about their fetuses.
Once local Bishops decide who dies and who lives it takes away their ability to pass judgement on abortion decisions by women.
in an earlier unpublished/censored post I stated that, as a worthless old man, you should sacrifice your self for the cause. you could even arrange a suicide party and go out in style. besides you could be hero in the eyes of the Economist Brotherhood.
ReplyDeleteUnknown-"-...you should sacrifice your self for a cause."
ReplyDeleteWe're about the same age, in our 80's. We don't need to sacrifice ourselves. If there is a shortage of respirators the shortage will make the decision for us. We're toast.
You’ve got to love the way the world turns. Sarah Palin and other right-wing conspiracy enthusiasts falsely claimed Obama’s Affordable Care Act provided for “death panels” which would decide the fate of the old and infirm. Now that scenario may come home to roost on Trump. Mother Nature does try to cull the herd from time to time with disease and famine. Human nature takes a different tack on the cull with it’s wars over Mother Nature’s resources.
ReplyDeleteArdy B "Now that scenario may come home to roost on Trump."
ReplyDeleteYes, "death panels", "socialism", "Keynesianism", "national debt", "government intervention"...they are all OK now. Then, running out of resources like test kits, respirators, hospital beds, doctor time, etc. and letting some people die just will never happen in the minds of some believers. The brutal truth is we are here because the weak died over the last 200,000 years. Probably there was a lot of infanticide over those years as well. We can all celebrate most of that does not happen to us in the U.S. But to say it can never nor will never happen again probably is wishful thinking.
What happened to Truman’s “The Buck Stops Here”? Buck passing is now the order of the day, the state of play, from Trump, while all around him gyrate the prats of groveling sycophants. “America First” is code for fix the blame, not the problem. Jon, you know better than I, what is the consequence of runaway capitalism?
DeleteArdy B "runaway capitalism"
ReplyDeleteKarl Marx wrote about that, capitalists eat each other, labor takes over. It didn't happen because business interests recognized he was right and the could not starve workers and survive themselves. That scenario, business interests pushing no regulation and unequal distribution of income too far than righting things for a while with more regulation and bigger government, has happened several times in my lifetime. It is happening again at this moment. So, the real world consequence of runaway capitalism is capitalists increasing regulation and government for their own interests.
It's hard to say what runaway capitalism would be like if capitalists did not right the ship over and over. Poor countries where a few rich people own most everything and everyone else lives in squalor.
Jon, thanks. So we are in the deregulating of business and dismantling of government institutions phase of the cycle and a disease rather than Marx is effectively exposing its excesses. I wish you and your family well sir.
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