Meet Me at Covid Corner

      It is unfortunate pandemic came at a time when everything that happens in our country, including dandruff, is considered a crisis. I posted about this phenomena long before Corona morphed from a beer into a virus. The true crisis is that there is too much media. When I was a child there were three TV channels, the news came on three times a day, and TV programming took the night off. Now we have multiple news channels on 24/7 and frankly, there is only about 20 minutes worth of news to report per day. So to fill the rest of the time they must manufacture news. Big news! Even big weather! Last year's unseasonably early snowstorm was declared HISTORIC! A snow storm in Montana, who knew? A recent storm surge on the east coast hyped by the Weather Channel as UNSURVIVABLE, was disappointingly remiss in killing people.

     So dropping Covid 19 into the crisis cauldron continually cooking in our country, was like wearing a Trump mask to a BLM rally. Actually, you don't have to do anything to ignite a BLM get together, where BYOB means bring your own bricks. Covid 19 is not all bad news though, it gave the media outlets something to talk about besides Russia collusion. And the reporters took seriously their responsibility to calm the public, by talking about Corona virus non-stop round the clock. Even when predictions of infection rate and deaths were off by 90 percent, it did not diminish their enthusiasm for KEEPING US CALM! Instead, they segued to speculation about shortages, unemployment, the future financial fallout and that Trump, even if he was miraculously healing the sick, is handling it wrong.

      The corner of Crisis and Covid is a busy intersection with injuries and fatalities reported daily. Sad, but not surprising. What is surprising is that after months of announcing that the numbers would rise when businesses and schools reopened, these same reporters (not to mention our public health experts) continue to be shocked when it actually happens. And if they don't believe their own news reports, why should I?

 

 

 

 

Old Re-Lie-Ables

      By this point in the election cycle, most of us would rather have dental surgery sans anesthesia than watch another political commercial. I stopped believing campaign ads in my 30's when I realized no one's pants were catching on fire even though they were lying. In our house, the job of muting the political ads is practically a sacred trust, and the remote is the holy grail. It would be one thing if there were any originality in the ads, but only the faces change. Here are a few of the old re-lie-ables.

• Identify the candidate with a state they have been in (if only to use a rest stop) least like the state they are running in. In Montana, that is any state on the east coast.
• Center the opponent's face against the worst representations of their party, preferably looking insane, which is almost any picture of Nancy Pelosi.
• Remove one positive element from a bloated, impractical bill-- this year, the Affordable Care Act, and say the opponent wants to take it away, and possibly steal Grandma's walker.
• Guilt by association. Take the most radical agendas of the opposing party and claim the opponent supports them, regardless of their stand as an individual.
• Use the term millionaire as a slur even when the candidate became that way by building a successful business, assuming only unsuccessful businessmen are fit for politics.
  
• Endorsements from family members. No surprise there.
• Endorsement or un-dorsements from locals. This year, from towns even multi-generational Montana natives have never heard of. Surprise.
• For incumbents, recycle the lies told about them last election, even though they did not keep them from getting elected.
• For the presidential election, slap the same labels--hater, racist--they used last election and spend their campaign arguing against the labels. Since most voters did not fall for the "hate the label" tactic last time, I am fine with the Democrats trying it again. It helped get Trump elected.
  

          Even sadder than having to watch political ads is that, even when they are just photo shopping faces onto campaign ads from the Johnson vs. Goldwater election, someone is getting paid to produce them. They should pay us to watch them--no, not worth it.

No One in Modern America

     Even if I had just emerged from an underground bunker where I lost track of time, I could tell by the candy aisles and yard displays that Halloween is drawing near. It comes in second only to Christmas as the most decorated for American holiday. When my kids were small, we carved jack-o-lanterns (pumpkins are not evil), they dressed in costumes (not scary ones), we took them to church for carnival games and I took them trick-or-treating. Although Halloween has pagan origins, no one in modern America believes the kids wear costumes so the demons abroad in the streets won't recognize them. Nor do they think giving children treats is a bribe to get them to go to church and pray for them. Most of the churches I know hold some sort of carnival as a safe alternative for church kids and a witnessing tool for unchurched/pagan families.

     I think of the pagan origins of Halloween the same way I do cremation. Cremation definitely has pagan roots, but no one in modern America thinks cremation frees the pure spirit from the sinful flesh or that flames are needed to carry the deceased's spirit to heaven. It is simply a less expensive and land consuming (although high emission) way to dispose of a love one's body. The pagan associations with cremation were left behind long ago.

   Also left behind, except by Muslims and a few Christian sects, is the belief that women who wear their hair short or uncovered are, at best, immodest, at worst, prostitutes. Short hair may have been a prostitutes' billboard in Bible times, but it is more a badge of the blue-haired in mine. In America, women tend to wear their hair short late in life, when their prospects as a prostitute would be pretty poor. 

     If we look back far enough, many common traditions and practices have pagan roots. I remember my amazement as a new Christian, to find out in Acts 12 that Easter existed in Herod's time when the church was still in its infancy. I have enough trouble rooting out my obvious, conscious sins without rooting around for pagan roots and subconscious sins. The Christian life is counter cultural in any nation and era without worrying about how we might look to pagans of past centuries. So on Halloween night I will give candy to the (possibly four) trick-or-treaters who come to our end of the cul-de-sac. And the next day I will stock up on discounted candy to snack on as I attempt to hide out in an underground bunker until after the election.