Well there fellow Americans and citizens of the world no matter who you are or where you are around the nation or around the world as Covid 19 has created a new normal in a string of global pandemics, not limited to but to include SARS 1, the Swine Flu H1N1 and now Covid 19, it has become clear that disease and pandemics as part of globalization have changed the world, and created what may only be described as a new norm.
Therefore shouldn't we have a national referendum in all US states and in all jurisdictions and all provinces and countries around the world, to decide immediately on providing all persons with a guaranteed minimum income for life, and guaranteed health care for life. Concurrently shouldn't we also have a referendum everywhere as an issue in governance by consent as to who is locked down and who isn't, for how long and when?
Isn't this a discussion whose time finally now has come, because it is clear as part of the cost of globalization which will never be ended because it is too profitable for the few. As an issue in survival the many now require certain minimum guarantees as a right of citizenship for all legal residents without exception. Everyone is provided a cradle to grave guarantee of a minimal national income, because if the economy at little or no notice can be shut down at any time you cannot depend on work to meet your mortgage or rent payments anymore, that model is gone forever.
For those who think otherwise I would politely suggest that perhaps those of us who won't accept this are living in a comfortable place called denial. It may be in the future that persons are required to have a health passport in addition to a national passport to permit international travel.
If you can lose your business, your employees, if you are a landlord your tenants, anytime an airliner or plague ship docks in your vicinity, you could lose everything you have worked for all your life overnight with no notice, and probably little or no compensation even. It is impossible to buy an insurance protection as it is considered an act of God. No one will underwrite your risk ever!
So unless you would like to wind up homeless during a pandemic, you are going to have to insist on acquiring some basic level of protection for yourself, for your family, for your community, because you may be asked to lockdown in place at little or no notice, at a time when most Americans cannot afford an extra $500 emergency expense.
The real question becomes what will you do and what can you do? Well the answer is you can't do anything, but collectively legally working through the democratic process we can do everything, and that includes creating laws when lockdowns happen and they will happen again, who is eligible to be lockdowned and for what purpose and for how long and who is exempt?
Obviously not everyone can be lockdowned and not everyone can be exempt so how do you decide? Should people of a certain age be required to be locked down? If so how do we figure out those guidelines. People are talking about these issues we might as well be talking about it here at the DKos as well.
When we determine age and age cut off to be locked down, how do we determine what age is? Is it simply a birth date? Or is it a state of health? Should it be determined by the amount of gray hair a person has? Or their bone density? Because some older Americans can run marathons, and some younger Americans aren't able to run to the post office.
Should we have a physical fitness test to determine your fitness not to be locked down? Then we have to determine whether or not people living with handicaps should be exempt from this if they are essential workers.
We also have to determine what and who is an essential worker and why? Where and for how long? Is a physician an essential worker, is a physician living with handicaps an essential worker. Some people will say whose taxes do you want to raise in order to pay for a national income? To which I say whose taxes do you want to raise to pay for yet another bank bailout on Wall Street by and from Main Street?
Ergo shouldn't we have a bailout post Covid 19 for the American people, because I can guarantee you the airline industry and the banks will be looking to the government for a huge bailout and you will be paying for it, so where is your bailout going to be? If we are going to mandate a national income shouldn't we also mandate that income cannot be garnished by anyone for any reason from cradle to grave, because let's be clear about this, fellow Americans and citizens around the world you will be locked down again and again and again, because the importation of pandemics to your community is considered to be part of the cost of globalization, an inescapable part.
So you cannot depend on being able to go to work to meet your needs, because your ability to go to work or to run a business can be taken away at short notice at any time, as part of the cost of globalization.
You could be locked down for many weeks, months, maybe even years! What then? Without guarantees of a basic income for life how can you meet your obligations, because let's understand the government won't nationalize all business and commerce ever, the ultra wealthy would never permit that as they would lose all their wealth, influence and prestige.
If you cannot receive a guaranteed basic income for life, which cannot be taken away, then in the post Covid 19 world how will your survive, how will your families survive, how will your communities survive?
I am not talking about job loss or losing a business that is part of the cost of capitalism.
I am talking about the entire economy being shut down so you cannot get a job anywhere else either, you cannot start a business anywhere else either.
You cannot leave the house.
During lock downs shouldn't we the people decide who gets locked down and who doesn't, as an issue of governance by consent? Do we shut away all seniors and vulnerable persons, if so who decides that?
Are you permitted to have a voice, are we permitted to have any discussion, or will we simply be treated like children sent to their home on an as needed basis, when the adults in the room speak out. Why can't we have a national referendum on a state by state basis both in the US and around the world? Why can't we have a voice?
If you want to go out, if you want to go to church, if you want to go to work, if you want to go home to family and friends, if you want to visit a loved one sick in hospital who is dying, who is going to decide, who do you trust to decide whether you can do these things?
If you think that once Covid 19 is done that this will go way forever let me please suggest to you, you must be living in a comfortable place called denial because it is not going to happen. This is what all of us are already thinking and too many of us are afraid to say. When it is your time to go how will you go, will you go in a hospital surrounded by strangers, or family.
If you don't decide it someone else will, and when they do how will you live with it.
How will those you leave behind live with it. We are all trapped between the immensity of life and death all the time, and how we deal with it decides whether or not we are human and humane!