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Kendall P. Stanley| The Petoskey News-Review

Its bad enough that the southern states are battling quickly rising rates of COVID-19, but now comes along Hurricane Ida burying some parts of the south under 18 inches of water.

Im sorry, I cant imagine that amount of water in one storm in one day.

That came after 150 mph winds slashed through areas south of New Orleans, in some cases cutting communities off from the rest of the state.

Communities along the Gulf Coast are now having to contend with storms that start out as a semi-reasonable Category 1 or 2 and then hitting parts of the Gulf that are warmer and exploding into Cat 3 or 4, as was Ida.

Thanks to climate change, the waters in the gulf continue to warm and thats not good for hurricane development. The warmer the water, the stronger the storms.

Even though more and more homes are being built on stilts, there are still large areas of states like Louisiana that are not on stilts and the buildings take the full brunt of winds and storm surges.

I will grant you that some areas downstate are prone to flooding from torrential rains but we are normally spared community-wide flooding events that make towns uninhabitable.

As of Monday the reports were saying it may be weeks before power is fully restored in Louisiana.

I just cant imagine.

The New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie asked a provocative question Tuesday Do Republicans actually want the pandemic to end?

Bouie noted that when President Obama came into office promoting unity, the GOP did everything in its power to thwart that effort. By the midterm elections, Obama had become a divisive president to some.

He writes, Joe Biden, in his 2020 campaign for president, promised to get the coronavirus pandemic under control. With additional aid to working families and free distribution of multiple effective vaccines, he would lead the United States out of its ongoing public health crisis.

I think you can see where this is going.

Rather than work with him to vaccinate the country, Bidens Republican opposition has, with only a few exceptions, done everything in its power to politicize the vaccine and make refusal to cooperate a test of partisan loyalty. The party is, for all practical purposes, pro-Covid. If its sincere, it is monstrous. And if its not, it is an unbelievably cynical and nihilistic strategy. Unfortunately for both Biden and the country, it appears to be working.

It starts in Congress where Marjorie Taylor Greene and others talk about the brown shirts coming to your door to force you to get a vaccine, to SenatorsTed Cruz and Rand Paul and their efforts to keep Americans safe from the vaccine:

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas has attacked vaccine mandates There should be no mandates, zero, concerning Covid, he said ina recent interviewwith the Fox News host Sean Hannity while Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky has urged Americans to resist efforts to stop the spread of the virus. Its time for us to resist,Paul saidin a video posted to Twitter. They cant arrest all of us. They cant keep all of your kids home from school. They cant keep every government building closed, although Ive got a long list of ones they might keep closed or ought to keep closed.

Then on the state level we have governors Ron DeSantis of Florida (currently atop the new cases list) and Greg Abbott of Texas, both of whom are working diligently to make sure masks and vaccine mandates never occur in their state.

And after all of the ways DeSantis has worked to block efforts to stem the pandemic who does he blame? President Biden.

You know, he said he was going to end Covid. He hasnt done that, the Florida governortold the Fox News host Jesse Watterslast week. At the end of the day, he is trying to find a way to distract from the failures of his presidency.

If you want to talk about failures, theres 16,000 people hospitalized in Florida and thousands of those are in intensive care. You can blame the governor.

Are all Republicans resisting vaccinations and fighting mandates and restrictions? Certainly not, although their vaccination rate is about 13 percent below that of Democrats.

One has to wonder how those who arent vaccinated or mask wearing figure this pandemic is going to end. For many it has resulted in their coming down with and dying from the virus. How many more people will have to die before what seems to be a Republican institutionalization of fighting Covid prevention efforts comes to an end.

When will Texans Cruz and Abbot see the light on masks and vaccines for the citizens of their state?

Oh wait, never.

Question answered.

Kendall P. Stanley is retired editor of the News-Review. He can be contacted atkendallstanley@charter.net. The opinions expressed in this column are those of the writer and not necessarily of the Petoskey News-Review or its employees.

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