March 28th
13 days since restrictions really kicked in in Ireland with the closing of the pubs. In the last 3 days, the United States has shot to the top of the charts in infections. It now has 100K with 1,543 dead. Next is Italy with 86,000 and 5,909 dead. Ireland’s numbers are 2,121 and 22, daily delta: +302 infections and +2 deaths. The infection rates are creeping up daily but there’s been no big spike. People around seem to think that the strategy of tamping down the numbers with aggressive testing, social isolation and contact tracing is working.
Back to what I was talking about above, my pet theory on the groups that make up the new right – the capital gang and the anti-immigration cohort. The economic hit from Covid-19 is so severe and so abrupt that the small government, pro-capital faction has had to accept the unacceptable: the massive monetary and fiscal intervention by governments around the world, for the simple reason that the shock is so large it threatens to savage all in front of it. There is no survival of the fittest when the jungle and everything in it is washed away in a cataclysm. So between gritted teeth, these champions of the efficient market welcome the billions of monetary and fiscal support as a necessary evil, aligning themselves more completely and truly with their right-wing fellow travellers that I they probably ever imagined. In their articles and commentary, they stress the uniqueness of the situation, how this can only be short term, and how the government must never seek to supplant that which can be better performed by private business, but a line has been crossed and I, for one, think it will be hard to uncross it.
The real long term impacts of this pandemic will be proportional to the costs born during it. This week, right now, possibly thanks to a fresh supply of weed, I’m of the opinion that the cost will be high, very high, and the long term impacts will be pronounced, exceeding so. It is a global crisis for a globalised world, and how we think about our world of today will change. The last great goal conflagration was WW2. That awful, dehumanising blood bath of a war between nation states gave rise to the United Nations and other international bodies. What started of as an expression of power by nation states ultimately exposed their limitations. The same will happen this time. After the period of fear driven border shutting and export restrictions has passed, once again nation states will shake their collective heads in frustration at their inability to cope with global problems and they will look to international collaboration as the way forward. Covid-19 will become a rallying point for those who believe in internationalism, many of whom have in recent years felt despair as the new nationalists who elected Trump pour disdain on international collaboration. The world is about to enter a new chapter, where the realities of climate change and the risks around global connectedness will become mainstream concerns. The globalisation of economies, powered by free flowing capital, relative global peace and the information revolution wrought by the internet has raised hundreds of millions out of poverty around the world; furthermore, it has removed the spectre of inflation, and made war between economically powerful nations almost impossible, such are the mutual dependancies in supply chains, ownership and markets.
Even with the global shutdown for the pandemic the global market place continues to ship products all around the world. Ali Baba continues to link manufacturers in China with customers around the world, Amazon continues to sell and ship products bought from its online marketplace, and Apple, Facebook, Google and Netflix continue to serve their global user base with ads, apps, content and connections. This globalisation will not stop because it brings new technologies and thus new opportunities to individuals, rich and poor, all around the world. No, the impulse will not be to stop globalisation, it will be to regulate it.
This virus is a nightmare for the new nationalists. The sheer uniformity of global response undermines their core message of single country exceptionalism. According to the nationalists in each country, theirs is unique. This idiocy puts to mind the image of dogs in front yards. Alsatians, collies, Jack Russels, mongrels, all kinds of dogs, all barking at the postman, all proclaiming with those barks that this place is special because this place is mine. When viewed from above with a cheap Chinese drone, all those front gardens look the same. Despite the differences in size and shape, they all have the same purpose and thus the same elements. They share a role and a function and so do the dogs that mind them. How much more do they have in common than what separates? How much more logical to gang together to find better ways to maintain the gardens and improve doggy health? It’s a no-brainer. There is no going back.