Another Week with Nowhere to Go

It's been a long seven days since my last update, so I thought it was time to make another record of my observations.

So what has happened in the past week ?

In the USA we have the ongoing spectacle of the upcoming Presidential election. The narrative was diverted for a few days by President Trump, his wife and an ever increasing number of White House staff being infected with the virus. Of course Trump was never going to a well behaved patient, and spent his time enthusiastically spreading his contagion to just about everybody within a 10 mile radius. He even interrupted his time in hospital to conduct an expensive (and very dangerous) drive around the neighbourhood. It would be crazy if it was made up, it's even more crazy when it actually happened.

After a few days in hospital, treated with the very best drugs that power and money can buy (and that few others in the USA could afford), he made a very public return to the White House. He claimed that he had assessed himself and discovered that he was a "perfect physical specimen" and that he felt better than ever. He went on to make the even more ridiculous claims that the coronavirus was a "gift from God" and that he was "extremely young". And this is the man that is the supposed leader of the free world. I really hate watching that guy, but somehow his behaviour is so outrageous, that it is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. You shake your head in disbelief, but you can't take your eyes off it.

What about things closer to home ? The biggest event in Australian politics in the past week has been the Federal Budget. Twelve months ago we were promised that we would see the very rare spectacle of a budget surplus. Of course, the arrival of the pandemic quickly sent that promise sailing somewhere out over the proverbial rainbow. The government immediately went into a lather of furious spending, in an attempt to keep as many people as possible still in jobs (even if those jobs were just sitting at home, watching TV, and waiting for the pandemic to pass).

The promised meager surplus quickly transformed into the biggest deficit that the country has ever faced. Now that the budget has been finally brought down, we can see how huge that deficit actually is. In the space of six short months, we now face a devastating deficit of over 200 billion dollars. That is really a massive number, almost as big as the personal fortune of Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon.

For those of us who do not understand the mysteries of economics, it is always staggering to see where such sums of money can be just made to appear out of thin air. And of course, Australia is not the only country that is currently performing such Herculean feats of Monetary magic - every country on Earth is doing the same thing. So where does the money actually come from ? We are told that it is all "borrowed money". If that is the case, who then is it borrowed from ? If every country is simultaneously also "borrowing" stupendous amounts of money, then even Jeff Bezos would not be able to provide the loans. There appears to be a bottomless pit of virtual money that all countries can access in such times.

The day after the handing down of the Federal Budget, the Leader of the Opposition is given his chance to put forward his own alternative solution. We then had the incredible mental gymnastics of Anthony Albanese promising to throw even vaster sums of money at everything and everyone in sight. And this has come just a few hours after he had enthusiastically criticized the government for creating a debt that would put everyone's grandchildren into penury. His solution ? To spend even more. It is little wonder that politicians are held in such low regard around the world.

And what about the situation in Victoria ? With only little more than a week to go before Dan Andrews promised to further relax the restrictions, it is looking more and more obvious that the lockdown is set to be extended for an indefinite time into the future. The target of achieving a 14 day rolling average of less than 5 new cases a day was always going to be unrealistic. Now is it rapidly becoming a mathematical impossibility. With another 11 cases today, the 14 day average is sitting stubbornly around 9.8.

We have now endured the lockdown for many weeks and people are finally reaching the tipping point. The 5 km travel restriction means that families are split. Many people have been denied almost all human contact and their mental states are suffering. On a personal level. we have not seen our youngest grandson for many months, and he has now achieved many important developmental milestones without us being there to share them with him. As to when we will be able to see our family in Queensland, that is beginning to seem unlikely for at least another six months.

More and more people are stating publicly that they will not allow the lockdown to be extended any longer. The government is facing the very real probability that many will just ignore the restrictions if they are not relaxed a little.

This is all taking place against the backdrop of the ongoing fallout from the hotel quarantine debacle. Dan Andrews continues to refuse to answer any questions about the fiasco, instead choosing to hide behind the lame excuse that he will wait until the inquiry hands down its findings. In the meantime, the ex health minister has made the extraordinary claim that Dan Andrews' testimony is not to be trusted. Although the mistakes made in administering the quarantine have been responsible for most of the deaths and infections in Victoria, not once has anyone apologised or admitted making a mistake. Victorians continue to suffer, without a clear end in sight.

So is there any good news ? To finish on a positive note, I should record that the number of active cases in our state has continued to fall. It now stands at around 200. We also now have only 17 Victorians still in hospital with COVID, and no one is currently on a ventilator. At the height of the second wave we had almost 700 in hospital, so that is a cause for some celebration at least.Read more