Legacy of Lies

""When you get those jobs that you have been so brilliantly trained for, just remember that your real job is that if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else. This is not just a grab-bag candy game."  - Toni Morrison 

Starting about a week ago, forecasters for Denver weather made national headlines by predicting a major cold front and storm system would move into the area - extinguishing our early September heat wave and threatening our pipes and plants. The news was not entirely welcome here, our fame for the winter storm warning more annoying than flattering, but the advance notice gave us time to wrap the pipes in towels and garbage bags, unhook the hoses and move our more fragile plants indoors. The preparation saved some minor heartache.

Imagine how much better the country's response to the COVID threat would have been if the president had told the truth and prepared us for the reality of the virus? After reading about the interviews 45 gave to Bob Woodward, and listening to the tapes - which Trump knew were being made - it is obvious that Trump knew the truth about the virus and lied to the American public, ostensibly to avoid panic but really to "protect our shipping industry, our cruise industry, cruise ships, we want to protect our airline industry."  Priorities were big industry and the stock market, not human life. (Quote from the NYT, Sept 10, 2020, Michelle Goldberg).

Our current president is obsessed with the idea of his legacy. He willingly gave 18 interviews to famed author Woodward, whose first book about the president was scathing. 45's fascination with the history books and what they will say about him drove him to hide the truth about the virus - that it is much more deadly than the flu, passed on through airborne transmission, and harmful - even deadly - for young people. His misguided belief was that a strong stock market and continued profits in the pockets of rich cronies would somehow protect him from the penetrating regard of historians and future citizens. It's ironic that our country's failure to counter the virus effectively has continued to strangle our economy, as if the invisible market forces recognize the value of human life more than our president. 

The president is not the only American who thinks a bank account will be their legacy, who confuses being rich with being important, power with lasting regard.  As a country, we seem to prioritize possessions over people, condemn protesters if property is damaged while ignoring the real cost of human life.  Human capital is the real prize of any country, the driver of innovative solutions, a network of resources on the ground to grow families, communities and neighborhoods. 

As Morrison said to her students, the point of power and freedom are to share them. The legacy of any human life will be shaped by the lives we touch, by how we make people feel, by how we include other people in our own prosperity.  The history books will not be kind to our current president or to the movement that supports him. He leaves a legacy of lies that has killed almost 200,000 Americans, beloved mothers, fathers, grandparents, children. How could anyone think that a record stock market could outweigh that human toll, that fleeting economic prosperity could balance out the immense loss of a nation?