Danny De Gracia: Our turtle governance model falls short of Covid


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It’s official: Hawaii is now a red state. And when I say “red” I mean that with the worst outbreak of Covid-19 cases since the pandemic began, we are scorching hot.

Now I keep getting frantic emails from people telling me it is good that Covid is spreading like wildfire in our communities because it means the pandemic will end much faster. Yes, you keep telling yourself that, because there are still many letters in the Greek alphabet after which new varieties can be named.

Every epidemiologist wants to be “infect everyone as a cure” the Dr. Thomas Schelling Covid, i.e. until their close friends die of the disease or their family members suffer permanent damage to their health. In my case, I’ve experienced both in loved ones, so I know only too well what this disease can do if not properly treated.

And no, I don’t want to see your so-called “suppressed information” or “prohibited therapies” because I’m picky enough to know that there is so much politicization, monetization and disinformation on both sides of the Covid debate that you are the ghosts always have to test to see if they are true or not.

When people ask me who I trust in this pandemic, I tell them I don’t trust anyone. A page want you to calm down So you’re going to spend as much money as you can until you die to grow your profits and earnings, and another side wants you to be ungovernable so that you can buy their vitamin supplements and political books and vote for their Contrarians in 2022, which falls to me heavy.

We need to rethink our strategy. As an Omicron variant of Covid now accounts for 73% of all new positive cases in the US, and with Hawaii seeing appalling numbers of cases every day given our small population, we are in a dire position right now.

Suffice it to say if you listen to President Joe Bidens Press conference last week on Covid gives me no confidence in the way things will go for us here in Hawaii. The cacophony of state and local press conferences on Oahu‘s outrageous case census last week was equally disastrous.

All of their messages sound the same to me: “Don’t worry – if you are vaccinated. But then again, you will likely get Omicron even if you are vaccinated, but it won’t be that bad. Oh, and use personal responsibility. Selection! For us everything revolves around the choice. “

Maui Grand Wailea
Hawaii needs to do more than just encourage people to get vaccinated. Ludwig Laab / Civil Beat / 2021

Excuse me? I love the way we pay billions in hard earned taxes every year to run some of the most massive public safety and regulation bureaucracies at the county, state and federal levels, but when there is indeed a crisis that requires your help , now they all want to be free marketers who believe in personal choices and cannot do anything.

Our expensive government of the nanny state Hawaii wants to protect me from myself every other day of the year, but now they’re working on Covid.

With great power comes great responsibility. We have a personal responsibility to protect ourselves, but the local government has an even greater responsibility to protect us when things are beyond our individual control.

While it’s true that if you feel unsafe you should stay home, if we allow this virus to spread this much, it won’t be long before the disease finds those who stay at home too. The more people this disease afflicts, the more opportunities the disease has to adapt to evade it our screening or resisting our treatments – this is called natural selection.

The line called for by our government “Get vaccinated, get topped up, and if you get sick, that’s okay too” will not be enough.

The more people become ill, the greater the chance that we will have many people in the future who suffer from debilitating chronic long-term illnesses. You will also have fully vaccinated seniors, diabetics, heart patients, and immunocompromised who do everything they can to stay safe, but at some point – through no fault of their own – will be surprised by a future, greater stress and may succumb to it.

Flexibility and initiative are now required to break the surge.

First, the Honolulu government must send home any city workers who do not provide personal customer service for teleworking. If Honolulu sees a boom, the city will have to worry about government continuity. Save your city workers, they are vital for running this city, don’t let them get sick or die.

Next, lawmakers must come out of their cave and convene a special emergency meeting to collect bills for coping with the rise in Covid. I understand that they like to do nothing so they can blame Governor David Ige for everything, but the turtle model of governance is getting old. If laws need to be passed to replace the emergency government, go for it.

I remember a brief but memorable letter from the US Air Force Lieutenant General Curtis LeMay sent once in July 1949 to a Major General Emmett O’Donnell, Commander of the 15th Air Force, when there was a flurry of plane crashes. LeMay wrote: “In June Strategic Air Command had fourteen accidents. Eleven of the fourteen were in the Fifteenth Air Force. Do something.”

I am now saying the same to our guides in Honolulu. Covid hits Oahu disproportionately and cases are out of control. Do something.

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