When I was a small child, I was given a ceremonial Knights of Pythias sword. On the blade was inscribed Robert Lewis, which just happened to be my name. In childhood, the sword won me many an imaginary duel, and pierced any number of cardboard boxes.
How did I come by such a childhood treasure? Well, my father was the youngest of ten children, and he was born in 1910. One of his older brothers was named Robert, and my Uncle Robert was an upstanding young man and a member of the Knights of Pythias.
Uncle Robert perished in the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918. And now, 102 years later, I am looking at my name on the blade of the sword and musing about the irony of the vicissitudes of fate, and how, until a vaccine is developed, we denizens of the 21st Century really do not enjoy any more protection against a viral pandemic than we did more than a century ago.
All the antibiotics we have developed are useless against viruses. The speed and scope of air travel make us all vulnerable to any viral threat emerging anywhere on the planet within a matter of days. And we rely upon our political leadership and our medical experts to do their best to protect us from such threats. The world is a dangerous place, and incompetent sociopathic leadership does not make it any less so. In fact, quite the opposite.
VOTE BLUE NO MATTER WHO 2020