Many moons ago I travelled to Turkey and my wife which included a free week in Istanbul which we thoroughly enjoyed. It piqued my interest in the troubles Turkey was having and somehow, I found your posts (I think at Ricochet) which provided insight and information found nowhere else. I though you very brave to live and report the things you did in those times.
Then you disappeared and I am glad to have found you again through Newt.
I do disagree with the idea that the USA had a plan.
"We had the plans. We did not follow them.
We knew how lethal this virus was. We ignored the warnings.
We knew what we needed to do. We did not do it. "
The CDC had plans and facilities for dealing with small outbreaks, but nothing for this situation.
It reacted like an ossified government bureaucracy, fell back into fighting the last war and at the same time assured everyone, including the rest of the government, that it had this. Until, a few weeks later it when finally became apparent it did not.
Then we had to start improvising which always involves missteps and trial and error.
While the lethality was apparent, the contagiousness of asymptomatic spreaders was not. China and WHO kept the world in the dark about this for several weeks. They complained about and resisted any suggestion on banning travel from China. A few people noticed that at the same time, China had banned air travel from Wuhan to destinations in China and inferred there was a bigger problem, but they were attacked as xenophobic and ignored.
When the West finally figured out the asymptomatic spread from their own experience, it had spread so far that Europe, USA and most other places were beyond the point where containment by testing and contact tracing was possible.
We humans did not immediately know what we needed to do.
New virus, new characteristics.
In situations like this, humans first try to make the new circumstances fit into old patterns. They use the patterns to make decisions. This process saves the time and energy it would take to thoroughly think through the hundreds of decisions we make every day. It is efficient for daily life.
Only when old patterns do not work do we focus our attention, learn, innovate and adapt. The process takes some time. Less time than in the past because of our instant communication, but it still takes awhile to wrap our collective consciousness around a new problem and find the way forward.
This is a new circumstance. There is still much to learn. We won’t know the best path the deal with it for a while, but we are moving forward at a remarkable pace historically. We will get there.
Unfortunately, we can't wait until we have adequate information to make decisions, so many of our decisions will be imperfect. No way to avoid that.
Happy to have found you and look forward to your perspective and insight.
Well I've know of you many years and yes this news letter did come to my attention via Newt but Clair Spark is where I think you first crossed my radar while you were still writing from Turkey. Nobody is an absolute in my world and enjoy reading you and Newt and yes spirited debate as opposed to hurling insults is preferred. I myself told Newt in person of our issues with Chinese manufacturing back around 2010 at a book signing. You see my profession was Mold Maker, designing and manufacturing Molds for the Plastic Injection Molding Industry which left the USA about 30 days after Clinton gave FNTS to China then announced on TV that America had switched from an Agra/manufacturing based economy to a service based one. I only have a 12th grade formal education but even I could see that a nation the size of America can not sustain on flipping burgers for each other, the dollar must be created. It took until this pandemic for America to maybe realize this. I may not agree with you all the time but I appreciate your input, much like Ilana Mercer, another bright mind.
Claire,
Many moons ago I travelled to Turkey and my wife which included a free week in Istanbul which we thoroughly enjoyed. It piqued my interest in the troubles Turkey was having and somehow, I found your posts (I think at Ricochet) which provided insight and information found nowhere else. I though you very brave to live and report the things you did in those times.
Then you disappeared and I am glad to have found you again through Newt.
I do disagree with the idea that the USA had a plan.
"We had the plans. We did not follow them.
We knew how lethal this virus was. We ignored the warnings.
We knew what we needed to do. We did not do it. "
The CDC had plans and facilities for dealing with small outbreaks, but nothing for this situation.
It reacted like an ossified government bureaucracy, fell back into fighting the last war and at the same time assured everyone, including the rest of the government, that it had this. Until, a few weeks later it when finally became apparent it did not.
Then we had to start improvising which always involves missteps and trial and error.
While the lethality was apparent, the contagiousness of asymptomatic spreaders was not. China and WHO kept the world in the dark about this for several weeks. They complained about and resisted any suggestion on banning travel from China. A few people noticed that at the same time, China had banned air travel from Wuhan to destinations in China and inferred there was a bigger problem, but they were attacked as xenophobic and ignored.
When the West finally figured out the asymptomatic spread from their own experience, it had spread so far that Europe, USA and most other places were beyond the point where containment by testing and contact tracing was possible.
We humans did not immediately know what we needed to do.
New virus, new characteristics.
In situations like this, humans first try to make the new circumstances fit into old patterns. They use the patterns to make decisions. This process saves the time and energy it would take to thoroughly think through the hundreds of decisions we make every day. It is efficient for daily life.
Only when old patterns do not work do we focus our attention, learn, innovate and adapt. The process takes some time. Less time than in the past because of our instant communication, but it still takes awhile to wrap our collective consciousness around a new problem and find the way forward.
This is a new circumstance. There is still much to learn. We won’t know the best path the deal with it for a while, but we are moving forward at a remarkable pace historically. We will get there.
Unfortunately, we can't wait until we have adequate information to make decisions, so many of our decisions will be imperfect. No way to avoid that.
Happy to have found you and look forward to your perspective and insight.
Well I've know of you many years and yes this news letter did come to my attention via Newt but Clair Spark is where I think you first crossed my radar while you were still writing from Turkey. Nobody is an absolute in my world and enjoy reading you and Newt and yes spirited debate as opposed to hurling insults is preferred. I myself told Newt in person of our issues with Chinese manufacturing back around 2010 at a book signing. You see my profession was Mold Maker, designing and manufacturing Molds for the Plastic Injection Molding Industry which left the USA about 30 days after Clinton gave FNTS to China then announced on TV that America had switched from an Agra/manufacturing based economy to a service based one. I only have a 12th grade formal education but even I could see that a nation the size of America can not sustain on flipping burgers for each other, the dollar must be created. It took until this pandemic for America to maybe realize this. I may not agree with you all the time but I appreciate your input, much like Ilana Mercer, another bright mind.