Has The United States Learned Nothing?

Here's an article from May 2020. It's about the so-called "super spreader" in Korea. Some dude with Covid 19 went to Itaewon, a Seoul neighbourhood where I used to live and still go from time to time. He will be exhibit A. When it was learned that he had the virus and that he had gone to some clubs in Itaewon, some gay clubs, in an area where foreigners are known to congregate, South Korea sprung into action!

Exhibit A didn't know he had the virus. He was diagnosed days after his weekend of clubbing. But as a result of this one guy, phone records were pulled, CCTV cameras were studied, messages were sent to people who were traced to areas in which they could have come into contact with Exhibit A telling them to get tested, thousands of people were tested (most anonymously), clubs were closed, and across the nation, Koreans were somewhere between high alert and panic. To give you some idea, I wasn't in Itaewon during the two-week danger period, I was showing no symptoms, but I had visited a nearby neighbourhood within a few days of the danger period. I was ordered by my employer to get tested. That said, this incident gave us a really good chance to see both good and bad in the culture.

I have dealt in this blog before about the Korean blood obsession and devotion to cultural "purity," so I won't accentuate the bad parts any more than to say that Exhibit A made things tough on foreigners and gay people in Korea for a while, and with the hasty law enacting that invariably accompanies such public hysteria here, the effects could be felt for many years to come. This despite the facts that Exhibit A was a Korean, not a foreigner, and the results of the phone records showed that only 10-11% of people in Itaewon that night were foreigners. He may not have been gay, but he was clubbing in the gay club area.

I'm not so sure the pulling of the phone records was a "good" thing either, but all of the 10,905 who were discovered to have been in the vicinity of the super spreader's night on the town were contacted and told to get tested through text messages on their cell phones. Some were sent in English to the 10-11% who were not Koreans. I am trying to avoid saying that the concern wouldn't have been the same if this had been any other neighbourhood and any other bars, but in my opinion it wouldn't have. Although there were some cases of positive test subjects being exposed, losing jobs, or being "outed," Korean officials tried to keep the testing anonymous. This seems to suggest a concern more with safety and less with blame. And I think this was good!

There have been other similar pockets of cases not involving gay or foreign people and they've been handled well. I chose the above because it was the most extreme example of, I'll call it vigilance, on the part of Korea to combat Coronavirus.

Now, let's compare Exhibit A - the Itaewon Super Spreader, to Herman Cain, who I will call Exhibit B.

The question was "Do you think he caught Covid in Tulsa AAANNNNDDD are you doing anything to follow up on the tracking?" Well Mackaninny answered the first part with a highly scientific, "We'll never know." Trump himself said, "No, I don't think he did." So they're both very concerned with the blame, and sluff it off without any clear evidence, but McInaney actually says Cain did a LOT of travelling, but STILL didn't even take the logical next step that a normal human being with an ounce of giveashit takes when considering a person who is known to have a highly contagious virus -  concern for everybody he came into contact with. Not even mentioned. Though both blathered on about how much they loved Cain and how great a man he was and how much he will be missed, to obscure the main issue obviously. MacSilly even went so far as to say she is not going to "politicize" the death of so fine a man. Oh that's what it would be to show concern for everybody else, TRUMP SUPPORTERS mostly, who came in contact with him? Politicizing his death?

Let's... Holy LORD I'm laughing my arse off just thinking of this... let's try to imagine this same thing happening in Korea. Let's say a mouthpiece for President Moon Jae In were called to a press conference on what will be done about Exhibit A (the Super Spreader). Let's just imagine they'd even waste that much TIME here in Korea. A reporter asks the very same question, "What will be done about the tracking of people who've come into contact with him?" So the mouthpiece says, "Well, the Super Spreader was a fine, upstanding member of our society and a Democratic Party of Korea member. We're pretty sure he wasn't gay even though he went to those gay bars. He was a pillar of heterosexuality who ate stamina food regularly and took no inordinate amount of pleasure in giving or receiving a dong jim. He started as a humble goguma salesman, then rose to fame through his hit Bong Jjak album, "Kimchi Perfume." His fame earned him the Democratic nomination for the Gwangju riding and I don't want to cost his family or his legacy any face by politicizing his memory in such a way. It is inappropriate at this time to do any tra… excuse me, please get off the stage... to trace any... excuse me, excuse me, can we all just calm down now? We need to just - oygoo shipal - who threw that? Plea - hey, I am just giving you the message that I received - HEY, HEY, HEY!" And what would follow -no doubt- would be a lynching of epic proportions.

You see, Koreans are less concerned with the blame. They don't give half a sack of shit where the Super Spreader caught the virus. They care more about protecting the rest of the country and keeping the virus from spreading. I've never been one to overstate the general intelligence of the Korean people, but this is what intelligent people are concerned about. Kayleigh Mackafuckface went to HARVARD!!!! She'd be a HERO to almost any Korean just for that! And yet somehow this entire country has outsmarted her. How do you suppose that happened?

Could it be that her job is to disregard intelligence and stick to party lines? Lines that are drawn by her highly UNintelligent boss, Donald P.W.M.C.T.V. Trump? I don't think the party lines are drawn by that bozo, mind you, just hers. The lines are clearly drawn by the bosses of the party, and let's be honest, as Noam Chomsky says, "The Republican Party is not even a party. If it were there'd at least be SOME disagreement." It's an entity that has been purchased by wealth, to manipulate the people politically, into accepting what is best for only those very wealthy people. They have bought the people who make laws and legislate the behavior of private citizens and they have paid a great deal of money to purchase the hearts and minds of those same people. That's the money that pays the salary of Kayleigh MacNonsense and Donald Snakeoil Trump. It also pays the salaries of those in the propaganda - excuse me - media industry.

So not to put too fine a point on it, it's money. Filthy Lucre. Is there anything else that could make people behave this way? They sing the praises of Herman Cain while refusing to even acknowledge the hundreds or even thousands of lives he, like our Super Spreader, unintentionally put in danger. Ostensibly because any concentration on the harsh realities of this virus would undoubtedly draw attention to the colossal failure it represents to the Trump presidency and campaign to extend it. In a word, fuck all those people! Do I need to pull out an old, dusty Uncle George once again? I think I do.

"They don't give a fuck about you. They don't give a fuck about you. They don't care about you. At all. At all. At all." Can't make it much clearer. And before you think I, myself am following party lines, I think the only Democrat who might have been an exception to this would have been Bernie Sanders, the guy Americans are overwhelmingly in favour of as their leader. But he can't get elected because he's not a Democrat.

Obedient workers! That's what these rich cocksuckers who've been "elected" are being told to make of you by our "owners." Those are the silent upper fractional percentiles who have more money than we can possibly imagine. I don't say that lightly because we can imagine a lot of money. But when you look at old Trumplestiltskin posing as John Baron, press agent to Donald Trump making a phone call to Forbes Magazine saying, "I basically... whoops, I mean Donald Trump basically owns all of Fred Trump's stuff. Yeah, he signed it over to me. My Dad is filthy rich, dude! I mean Fred Trump is a rich dude. Tremendously rich! The richest! He's got like a hillion billion dollars! He really should be on yer list! No, but I mean whoever he left his fortune to should be on your list. Of course he left it to me, John Baron. Uh, that is to say, NOT me, but Donald Trump, who I'm not." He was only trying to pose like he had a billion so he could get on the Forbes list and use that as collateral to borrow money because he actually DIDN'T have enough to qualify for loans.

The REAL owners of you and I aren't on the stupid Forbes 400. If they are, they've tremendously downplayed their wealth for the simple reason that if we knew how rich they ACTUALLY were, we'd revolt immediately. They scoff at a measly billion! If they had their way there would be billion dollar bills so they could carry wallets full of them! It's an exclusive club. And you ain't in it! Neither is Trump. He's just a wannabe. But he has his uses for the rich folk now that he's been put into power.

They want us to be obedient workers. They want us to obey them without knowing them. So they have these people posing as our leaders who can relay messages from the top. Ideally, people we respect and will obey. But in a pinch, Trump. Their latest message: Get back to work! Get the kids back in school! The Coronavirus is not that bad! Nothing is fucked here, dudes. Nothing is fucked.

If they traced the contacts of Exhibit B, we'd find people who've contracted the virus and then we'd have to trace them and so on and so on and so on... can't we just forget about this pesky virus and get back to making the rich people richer? Use whatever euphemism you like, but that is the "narrative from the top," those are the "party lines," and if we have this "unwanted downtime" for much longer, people are going to put two and two together and realize it's not so hard for the rich to afford. So after the "get back to work and school" message is obeyed, they've probably already got a "coronavirus cost the world economy a lot" message and a follow-up, "you (or laughingly WE) all need to tighten our belts to dig ourselves out of the Corona hole" message. Or maybe there will be a cure or a vaccine that will make the owners exponentially richer and it'll be more of a "This vaccine doesn't cover our losses from the virus so keep on working" message.

But these will be messages delivered in the new 2020-2024 term. Let's hope it's not still Trump relaying these messages.

All I was really trying to do when I started this post was to point out the GLARING difference between America run by pure greed and represented by Trump, and a country that still has a little bit of decency. I badmouth Korea from time to time, but the day I stop that is the day I just stop caring. In this instance, despite the ulterior motives, Korea is head and shoulders above the U.S. In fact, most countries are. It's not that great an achievement to obey the experts and do what the doctors say in case of a virus. It takes a monumental mental monument to slack jawed, knuckle dragging, cavernous stupidity or a dutiful lackey to the disgustingly amoral rich to disobey the experts and NOT do what the doctors say. Or, in case of this special yellow-headed cheesy poof, a fine blend of both.

And let's not forget our K-Lay McWhinneyninny! She's just the perfect spokeswoman, isn't she? Young. Trying to make a name for herself. Probably deep in debt from her education. She knows Trump's days are numbered. How many days till election day? What she needs to do is show her obsequiousness and prove to be a super-sycophantic ego stroker so that she'll be highly employable in her future. She's a Harvard girl. Don't be fooled into thinking she believes any of the shit coming out of her face-hole.

At least I hope she doesn't believe the discharge she's secreting. It would ruin one of my spank bank fantasies. Oh come on! Don't tell me you haven't noticed. She's gorgeous! And clever enough to play the bad girl? Rowr!

Oh now there I've done it! I've gone too deep and dark haven't I? But before you judge me too harshly, I'm certainly not the first or the last. So put that in your pipe and smoke it. And lest you start to expect from future posts, the sordid depths 2020 has forced me into, I offer a similar comparison that is on an unimpeachably superior intellectual plane. Look at this video. It's recently done by a guy in the UK. It's uncanny how the Spanish Flu, and the reactions of American people to it, compares to what they are going through these days! Almost as if they learned nothing!