Minnesota Report
Minnesota, as is the rest of the country, is experiencing a political upheaval. The sides are being drawn on mask mandates, vaccine efficacy and government response to the pandemic. As the debate rages, many people fail to see the forest through the trees, because it the pandemic, which some fools fail to believe, even with the death rate approaching 740,000 nationally, and 8,705 here in Minnesota, the concept of science and the reality is up for debate with the ignorant.
As we continue to hear the number of cases associated with the unvaccinated rise, and then those people once they contract the disease, have an epiphany, and wish they had taken the vaccine, the level of sympathy diminishes. Additionally, since Donald J Trump (R) is the prime culprit in spouting disinformation and now former White House Corona Virus Coordinator Dr Deborah Birx, his coconspirator, now says if a federal mask mandate had been made 35-40% less deaths would likely have occurred, it leaves one with a sense of futility.
It also brings to mind the fact, that Trump voters are less educated, with the fact, non-college educated supported him in 2016, and saw a decline in 2020. Whites lacking college degrees fell 4%.
To this point we are reminded about one of the first things learned in college, which was critical thinking, which is a didactive educational process. Critical thinking is a significant part of the Scientific Method, and we believe if taken to the point where if all fifty states are supposedly experimental laboratories of democracy, we wonder when the proof will materialize.
If as the Scientific Methods consists of a simple process:
- Make an Observation.
- Ask a Question.
- Test Your Hypothesis and Collect Data.
- Examine the Results and Draw Conclusions.
- Report the Results.
Does our social experiment fail because the structure of the question, the results are in dispute, or the conclusions drawn are flawed?
As we experience this pandemic, and the role played by government being challenged because some people do not recognize the need for government. Clearly, the fail to read the history of the 1918 Influenza pandemic, the 1929 Great Depression, the New Deal Franklin Delano Roosevelt (D), the creation of Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid and the Great Society programs of Lyndon Baines Johnson (D). As it is often said, those who fail to appreciate history are doomed to repeat it.
The ability to apply critical thinking, an appreciation of history and as this pandemic continues tot plague us, the worthy response is not to turn on Fox News and listen to the deniers, who actually are vaccinated just as Trump was when he took his mysterious trip to Walter Reed Hospital in the middle of the night to get his first vaccination in January. Which as we know, didn’t prevent him from getting the COVID virus at all.
This is our state of affairs, after experiencing the Presidency of a self-involved huckster, and carnival barker rather than a person concern with the wellbeing of our nation.