The Isolation Diaries No. 34

“Everybody in the south wants the privilege of whipping somebody else.” Frederick Douglass

Here in Santa Barbara several blocks of State Street, our restaurant, bar, and commercial (what hasn’t been destroyed by Amazon) backbone, are blocked to vehicle traffic for several hours a day, creating what the City calls a “pedestrian promenade.” Restaurants, which up to Friday the 22nd were only doing takeout business, are open again with restrictions on how many patrons can dine inside at a given time, and tables set up outside. 

After weeks of isolation, seeing hundreds of people strolling along State Street is startling. More startling is that 80 percent of people are not wearing face coverings. There was a line of people in front of Joe’s Cafe when we arrived to pick up our takeout order, and the tables on the sidewalk were full. The hostesses and waitstaff wore masks. Dining in at this point holds no appeal for us. We just wanted to collect our order of a spinach salad, turkey dip sandwich with salad and fries, ranch dressing, and two Manhattans and get back home. There was confusion at the front counter, the young woman behind it seemed harried, trying to handle our order and answer the phone, and doing neither well. No fault of hers. I felt bad for her. While we stood there, a woman in her mid-40’s who had been waiting outside entered and asked my wife and I if we were waiting for a table or picking up. It was clear from her tone that she assumed we had skipped the line. She wore a large, flashy diamond. Her vibe put me off immediately. “Well,” I said, “if we were waiting for a table we’d be standing outside, wouldn’t we?” She spun around in a huff and went back outside and resumed her wait. 

Back home we discovered Italian dressing instead of the ranch dressing we asked for, and the au jus sauce that makes the turkey dip was missing. The sandwich was dry, the French fries soggy. On the plus side, the Manhattan’s were the usual Joe’s strength. We ate, sipped our cocktails, and watched the last three episodes of the final season of Schitts Creek.

The problem is that ignoring the public health aspects of a pandemic will not make it go away; happy talk and magical thinking are equally futile. I can’t see how we avoid a second wave. 

The pressure to generate economic activity is intense and hangs heavy. After two months of isolation, it’s natural to want to get out, move around, have a drink in a bar, eat a meal, see people. City and state government officials are trying to balance public safety with the need to turn the revenue spigot back on; it’s like spinning six plates while standing on one leg. Since the federal government abdicated its responsibility for the pandemic, states, which have far fewer resources, have had to pick up the slack, blowing huge holes in their budgets in the process. Without an infusion of money from the federal government, states will have no choice but to cut services, furlough public employees, and adopt austerity measures -- at a time when public services are desperately needed. 

Trump and Company try to will the pandemic away with a toxic combination of lies, bluster, and threats. The problem is that ignoring the public health aspects of a pandemic will not make it go away; happy talk and magical thinking are equally futile. I can’t see how we avoid a second wave. When I checked this morning the Trump Death Clock stood at 58,708 deaths that could have been avoided if Trump had taken Covid-19 seriously and acted earlier. But expect no contrition or reflection from Trump. He insists that he would do the same things over again, including, it seems, shilling Hydroxychloroquine endlessly and stoking a culture war between red and blue states. 

Even if Joe Biden were leading Trump in the polls by 50 points, I would still expect him to find a way to blow it. November is a long way off, we’re in a pandemic, Trump’s in the White House, McConnell runs the Senate, and the Democratic Party establishment dithers at the margins

What do you get when for 40 years the reigning ideology in the world is how to monetize every aspect of human life? You get Bezos, Zuckerberg, and Musk; you get Steve Mnuchin, Jamie Dimon, and Timothy Geitner; you get staggering wealth and political inequality and environmental damage; you get government by money, of money, and for money; and to close out the neoliberal era with a near collapse and endemic corruption, you get Trump, an incompetent, semiliterate failure who sees himself as the best the white race has to offer. 

I just started reading Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, by David W. Blight, winner of the Pulitzer Prize. I’ve also been reading Red Square by Martin Cruz Smith, and listening to Western Stars by Bruce Springsteen. My wife finally acquiesced and cut my hair short with a dog grooming trimmer that we once used on Chula, my inlaws loveable Shih-poo. 

Keep an eye on the mortgage default rate in the next few months. In the words of Warren Zevon, send lawyers, guns, and money, the shit’s about to hit the fan.