By Gary Pichon

My wife wants me to stop writing because I am now so negative about the impact of the virus.  “Behold, I bring you bad tidings of sadness” never endears you to readers.

It is not the problem of the virus. It is our response to it that is going to tear a hole in the bottom of our boat.

We could have done what we have always done with the flu and let it run through the population, buried our vulnerable and got on with life. The 1968 flu pandemic killed 100,000 Americans and almost got my wife. We did nothing but live through it. Today that stoic approach scares the leaders including the perpetually optimistic President Trump.

We have destroyed the economy. We are building another mountain of debt. State, county and city governments face certain big reductions, universities will shrink dramatically, some industries will never recover. 

And if that is not enough, we have lost faith in our leadership at every level. The national media should be scourged for their part in this panic.

It will not be a V recovery. It will not be a U shaped recovery. It will be a dead cat bounce recovery or a sort of left hand only U. Everything will slide to the bottom and stay there for a long time like a pile of stinking rot.

The good news is that people don’t like the deliverer of bad news so no one will come around me and I am not ever likely to get that virus. I pray I will have to eat these words about a year from now. I have been monumentally wrong in the prophesying business before, so there is cause for hope.

And on that note, I am going down to the garden in the midst of a beautiful spring and plant some pole beans. 

I think we will need them.