Campbell's Commentary - TELE COVID19. TAN A YUH YAAD

By Aubrey Campbell

NEW YORK, NY. Monday, April 6, 2020 – Good day and glad to know you are putting up a fight against this monster of a pandemic. To those families whose loved ones have lost the fight, we stand with you as you mourn and to let you know we are all in this thing, together, social distancing, notwithstanding!

I have no doubt that you are feeling a bit overwhelmed and overloaded with all the information, commentaries, and conspiracies relative to the global pandemic that is the Corona Virus Disease – COVID 19.

I plead with you, please take it seriously, and be careful. You have a responsibility, as we take a minute to remember those who lost the fight and those who are at this moment, fighting, including the family of our beloved Consul General and my Cornwall College family!

To those on the frontline put on your full armor!

Those who have personally called to check on me, I thank you. As an asthmatic, my system is already compromised and so, I give thanks and praise up to this point because the authorities lied to me and millions more, when they said that the virus was not airborne. I say that because I just started wearing facial covering while on the outside, only a few days ago!

I am still young so I can’t afford to be stupid!

Prince or pauper, this virus is not sympathetic and what’s worse is that you can be a conduit without knowing!

Isn’t that a bitch on two legs?

Folks, leadership matters in times of crises, such as we are experiencing at this time!

I just have one wish and that is, to know the origin of this warfare and why was it necessary at this time, like now. Not when I’m gone from this life!

Are you with me?

Again, use your head to stop the spread. Staying home will save a life, and it could be yours.

The faces and stages of this pandemic are many and varied. You just don’t know, and that means paying fullest attention to all that’s being said, that way you can pick thru’ much of the nonsense!

This pandemic is forcing individuals and organizations to think outside the box in an honest attempt to manage this new world order.

Schools are not only navigating but embracing the e-learning matrix, and soon all the skepticism that surrounded online education, will be par for the short course, diploma and degree.

E-commerce is already in step, referenced by Cyber-Monday, but while governments stay from afar and cast their net, you must think inside the box while weighing your option.

The ATM is going to run dry at some point and this juncture could be that point.

Where am I going with this?

Crowd funding and telethons are fine but make sure you can dance where you call home before venturing to dance where others call home. It may not be unconscionable to stage a telethon at this time, but when Jamaicans here in New York City, who are on the frontlines, start dropping like flies and nobody can reach out because everyone is running scared or under lockdown, how is that going to help?

In other words, such a venture cannot be community-based at this time. Everybody is looking to get that stimulus check, even those who don’t own a business and those living single!

And what about those displaced students at the tertiary level here in the Diaspora? Will proceeds from the telethon benefit them?

Then I’m in, if not, send your emissaries and missionaries to the United Nations, the IDB, WB, IMF, WHO, PAHO, they are the ones sitting on the stockpile of funds earmarked for disaster mitigation and management!

And don’t come to me with any BS about government bashing. That is not the issue here.

The same Federal government that we can’t wait to change, is the same one that has gone out on a limb to ask landlords like mine, not to evict, the same ‘Feds’ – bumbling and confusing as they appear - that have asked businesses to stay open or keep employees like me, on the payroll even when there is no business to transact!

So, I don’t get it!

Yes, Jamaica has well-heeled friends in very high places, but some 90% of the world’s population was touched – for the very first time – by this pandemic!

You get my drift.

In your best Trumpian vernacular, say after me, ‘We will see’.

I commend governments around the Caribbean for moving swiftly to apprehend lawbreakers, Antigua & Barbuda, Barbados, and Jamaica come readily to mind. But I also know that oftentimes, individual freedom is a casualty of speed.

Did someone say we are in a war or, it was a case of likening the COVID19 pandemic to a war?

Same difference, right?

And then there is the question of an affair v a relationship. Foreign Affair v Foreign Relation as we see in the case of Jamaica, Cuba, the USA, China and Venezuela.

Cuban medics are in Jamaica as we speak. China sending personal protective equipment to the USA and regional integration in the Caribbean is under threat because there is still no decision in Guyana since their general elections on March 2!

BTW, didn’t the USA punish Jamaica for doing business with Cuba a few short months ago?

Foreign Affairs v Foreign Relations, the hypocrisy of our politics! If you know something, say something, join the conversation.

Happy Easter, though I’m not into the ‘bun’ bizniz. Just say Cheese, please!

You have the floor!

NB. Caribbean Conversation, Sundays, 2-4 pm, WVIP, 93.5 FM, and streaming live on wee radio network at; www.weeradioonline.com.