Genealogy is easy - all I have to do is find "Johann Weber" in this 1,254-page Book of Lutheran Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials, 1500-1985, from Württemberg, Germany, and I'll know the place and date of birth of my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. For real - twelve generations back. Now I guess my next pandemic, self-quarantine, fill-up-my-time project is to teach myself Middle Low German and how to interpret Sixteenth-Century clerical handwriting.
At least doing that will keep me from getting mad about Georgia's governor Brian Kemp and his latest affront to common sense, namely deliberately striking down Atlanta and other municipalities' face-mask and stay-at-home orders. If you're not from around these parts, or if you've been living under a rock (and if so, can I join you?), Georgia is currently experiencing a dramatic increase in new covid-19 cases. Even at the mid-April peak of the pandemic, we were averaging less than 1,000 new cases per day. But since July 2, the average hasn't been below 2,000 new cases and in the past week, we've experienced 1,816 to a jaw-dropping 4,904 new cases a day (source: NY Times Georgia Coronavirus Map and Case Count).
In response, several mayors across the state, including Atlanta's Mayor Bottoms, have issued orders that face masks are to be worn when in public and that people should stay indoors except for essential services. That approach has been proven to reduce infection rates earlier this year (e.g., New York, Boston, Paris, Milan, etc.) - it even slowed the virus down here in Atlanta last spring.
But the governor insists that he agrees mask-wearing is important - he even went on a a little wear-a-mask education tour across the state (read: campaign events). But he insists that issuing an order for masks is a "bridge too far" for him politically.
Okay, two things here . First, no one's asking you to issue any such order -we'll take care of it ourselves. People in rural agricultural counties don't feel they need masks? Fine. We'll set aside the science for a minute and not point out those rural communities are actually where the rate of infection is increasing the fastest. You folks do what you want, but here in the densely populated city, where social distancing can be a real challenge, we'll issue our own local orders requiring face masks, thank you. You do your thing, we'll do ours. But, no, Brian Kemp can't allow a common-sense, local-wisdom approach like that to exist. No, he has to go and issue an Executive Order specifically overturning any local ordinance more restrictive that his incredibly permissive, virtually non-existent regulations ("Look, if you're at risk and have the AIDS or sumpin', stay home. Seriously, stay home if you got the AIDS - we don't want to see you").
The other thing - think about what he's literally saying. "Masks are good and I support the idea and will even lead a tour promoting face masks. But politically, if I order it across the state, some rural voters will get upset and I'll lose their votes." He is LITERALLY putting his political ambitions ahead of the health and the lives of the fellow Georgians he was elected to protect.
A politician in Georgia will always succeed at pitting the large rural areas of the state against the urban citizens. It's the oldest trick in the book. Tell the farmers and woodsmen, "Look at them.. Big, dirty city. Living too close together, air full of smog, and all full of colored and queers. Their interests ain't ours. They ain't us."
And when we coloreds and queers elect a mayor to help protect us and require what's necessary to be done, he overturns it to win political points with his rural supporters and that ass-clown with a red hat up in D.C.
Damn, it makes me so mad!
Okay, mugen is the Middle Low German equivalent of 'mögen',:meaning can, or may; müeȥen is the equivalent of 'müssen', meaning must, or have to; and wëllen is the equivalent of 'wollen', meaning to want, as in "I wëllen Brain Kemp recalled from office pronto."
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