All Locked Up in the USA
Yes, the title is a takeoff of Bruce Springsteen’s “Born In the USA”.
Aside from the hundred (thousand?) reasons that I am upset at Trump’s mismanagement and corruption of the US government, and the fact that I am essentially locked in my house, I am also locked in the USA.
I thought that I would enjoy staying home from summer travels and watching travelogues. But I didn’t watch any until this afternoon. Now, I really miss not roaming the Sierras or Utah and Arizona. I can’t fly to Flagstaff because I don’t trust air travel in the time of the plague. I also can’t fly to Maui and Kauai because of that, and because Hawaii had to impose a 14 day quarantine because of Trump’s messing up the Coronavirus campaign.
We can’t leave the USA because Europe and Canada have banned us. “And Freedom, oh freedom, well that’s just some people talking”, “Desperado”, by the Eagles. We can’t take a cruise for the same reason. Why do we still have bans on Canadians or Europeans traveling here?
All of the Trumpite non-maskers and non-distancers cite “Freedom”, but their Chosen One has locked us up in the good old USA, USA, USA. America First has become America Only. He has not only killed European travel, but American travel as well.
The cramped and non-masked Trump rallies (infectathons), even in aircraft hangers which cut the breeze, will only spread more havoc in swing states, and lead to more closures. The fact that these rallies keep occurring, only reinforces the views of his followers that masking and distancing are unnecessary. More failures of leadership.
Spending six months in my sofa with my right arm propped up, has led to a tennis-like elbow that won’t even let me drive any significant distance.
I am pretty sure that us seniors staying at home, who are retired, and not in any way essential, will be very low on the vaccine priority list, since we are not daily exposed to the public. This, even though by age and resultant comorbidities, we are most vulnerable to complications and death from the Coronavirus.
Lincoln was right, “You can fool some of the people all of the time”. Right now, I prefer Moses: Let My People Go, and travel somewhere else. (Exodus 5:1)
