Cowley: I Feel Powerless
Demonstrators march up the steps of the Utah State Capitol in protest of the potential overturn of Roe v. Wade in Salt Lake City on May 5, 2022. (Photo by Xiangyao “Axe” Tang | The Daily Utah Chronicle)
May 24, 2022
The last couple of years have been incredibly taxing. Time and time again, I feel as if our government makes decisions that benefit only a select few. COVID-19 continues to spread and has mutated into many new and more contagious variants. The government continues to sweep pressing issues under the rug in order to appeal to a select group of people. And meanwhile, they do nothing to address the issues many Americans actually want to act on.
By making decisions that only benefit the minority of Americans, the government fails to accurately represent the people it governs. Our democracy is broken.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, national and local legislators repeatedly made decisions that failed to keep people safe. During the January 2022 Omicron spike, the Utah Legislature repealed mask mandates in Salt Lake and Summit counties a mere week after implementation. The Omicron variant spread much easier than previous variants, therefore posing a higher risk of skyrocketing case numbers. Even with this knowledge, legislators chose to remove all mask mandates and put more Utah residents at risk, especially the immunocompromised and those with other comorbidities. This move worked directly against the best interests of the people the Legislature should protect.
The federal government didn’t demonstrate any better response to the pandemic. They promised stimulus checks to help people make ends meet. In the end, the checks were disappointingly small and few and far between. The lack of governmental assistance forced people to put themselves at risk, going back to work before it became safe to do so. For many Americans, the assistance offered barely covered living expenses for a month. Even so, it didn’t stop conservative Congress members from pushing back, asking why they afforded such a “large sum.” However, the majority of Americans backed receiving financial aid from the federal government during the COVID-19 pandemic.
This string of unpopular decisions doesn’t stop at subpar COVID-19 response protocols. The leaked draft opinion from the supreme court revealed plans to strike down the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling. If Roe v. Wade gets overturned, 33.6 million people with uteruses could lose access to lifesaving health care. The blatantly partisan opinion does not reflect the views of most Americans today. The majority of Americans don’t support banning abortion, including many from both ends of the political spectrum. The court’s opinion doesn’t reflect the ideals of the people they are supposedly representing. It also negatively impacts the health of millions. The supreme court is not a governing body elected by the people. Allowing six people to take away the reproductive rights of millions of people opposes democracy. Unlike the other branches of government, we have no way of voting the justices on or off of the court.
Our government also has a diversity problem. Although white men only make up 30% of the U.S. population, they make up 62% of elected officials. This lack of diverse perspectives severely limits the scope of congress. It doesn’t accurately reflect the U.S. population. This limited perspective is reflected in Congress’ approval rating. As of right now, it sits at a mere 20%.
It’s been proven time and time again that Congress favors those with the most money and influence. A Princeton study found that the wealthiest 10% of Americans — those that speak for big business — have the most influence over what the government passes. Our government does not have the majority of the American people’s best interests in mind, only those who can make large donations to their campaigns.
In its current state, our government has done nothing but disappoint and frustrate me. A good government enacts changes that benefit its citizens, not actively make their lives harder. At this time, our government makes decisions that only benefit those at the very top, sweeping the needs of the majority of Americans under the rug. We need a government that listens to what the people need, one that can make decisions to benefit the country as a whole. I, like most other Americans, am tired of feeling powerless to the interests of the select, privileged few.
Remy Pijuan • May 26, 2022 at 12:46 pm
Very well said. Our democracy is rotting. People are hurting in myriad different ways, and the government does nothing – except, as you so aptly pointed out, disappoint and frustrate.
John Hedberg • May 24, 2022 at 3:17 pm
https://coronavirus.utah.gov/case-counts/
https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-walensky-study/fact-check-cdc-study-found-that-over-75-of-covid-19-deaths-in-vaccinated-people-were-among-those-with-at-least-4-comorbidities-idUSL1N2TS0S2
During the Omicron spike you mentioned, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky during a national appearance announced that 75% of COVID victims had 4 or more comorbidities, and the vast majority of fatalities were in people over 70. By January 2022, the vast majority of Utahns over 65 had received at least one vaccine shot, and those with comorbidities were allowed to be in the first wave to get shots along with the Seniors, so nearly everyone who was remotely vulnerable was already vaccinated. Meanwhile, about 20% of Utahns also had natural immunity from surviving COVID, and South Africa had already announced that Omicron was extremely mild in comparison to Alpha and Delta, so there was no particular reason to continue wearing masks when the vulnerable were protected and the strain was very mild.
My sister (a DVM) and I looked at the COVID mortality data on both the CDC and WHO websites, comparing COVID mortality to pneumonia and flu. We determined that for those under middle age (say 40-45), COVID was no more fatal than pneumonia or seasonal flu. In fact, for children, it was practically “safe”. In fact, I was far more saddened that businesses and institutions were requiring young people to get booster shots before Seniors and people with comorbidities in other countries (for instance, 80+% of Africans) ever got their first vaccine shot. That seemed incredibly callous and cowardly on our part, when we didn’t really need the protection, and others did.
I got 2 Pfizer shots, and I got COVID anyway during the Delta wave. Pandemics have been a fact of life all through history, and most vulnerable people got the vaccine early in 2021, so why should taxpayers pay people to stay home who aren’t at any more risk from COVID than from getting the flu? Today’s skyrocketing inflation is a result of trillions of government spending since March 2020. Did you think we wouldn’t have to pay that money back somehow? We’re doing so now, with much higher prices for basics, which is even worse for people than not receiving COVID funds, since inflation goes on and on and on and on and… All this was predictable, since it’s happened so many times around the world in the last 100 years. Overspending and inflation are synonymous.
We live in a democracy, but that doesn’t mean we leave all the work to other people. It never did. If you see a problem, it’s your responsibility as a citizen to act on it. We’re all equal in this regard. In most nations today, and for most of history, men have been subject to governments telling them what to do with their bodies (called The Draft). In this country, the Draft was eventually voted out. If anyone is concerned about abortion rights, we can form a consensus on how many weeks Utah wants to keep abortion legal, find the most popular number, and draft a bill that will pass in the legislature. The Draft was around dictating how men use their bodies for quite awhile, but because we get to vote and legislate, the Draft is now history. Every state has the responsibility and privilege to vote on this, too. We have that power. Suffering is a part of life for everyone, and nothing worthwhile is easy to accomplish, or stays finished without proper maintenance. Let’s get to work!
Oh, the whole privilege thing? 99.99% of the world looks up to you in amazement at the privilege you complain about having every day. None of it’s about race, since enslaved Russian soldiers are unwillingly fighting in Ukraine even today, and China treats the Asian Uighurs even worse than the Russians treat their own soldiers and the Ukrainians, and there are open slave markets in Africa right now, Africans selling Africans. We’re each individual human beings of great worth and diverse talents, sharing similar feelings, passions, intellect, and understanding because we’re largely the same inside, where it counts. All civil rights are ultimately human rights for this reason, and that’s why it’s in everyone’s interest to look out for each other, and love each other, as family. We are.
There’s no control in that love, but there’s great power in it, and in the human identity we share so thoroughly that a song a European man composed in the 18th century can literally make a Polynesian woman in the 21st century weep from the shared feeling of hearing it. How powerful is that humanity which is present equally in every one of us?
Best Regards,
J Hedberg