Tom Finneran: Silver Linings

Friday, April 24, 2020

Tom Finneran, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

Tom Finneran, former MA Speaker of the House

We are un-nerved. The pandemic has shattered our “normal” worlds.

People are confused, angry, frightened, and frustrated. Every working family in America falls into a worried restless sleep and awakens to an unchanging economic fear. We are in a long dark tunnel with no discernible light.

And yet, there are glimmers of silver linings ahead. Two deserve mention.

First, there is the growing recognition that our dreamy “one-world” brotherhood of nations is a juvenile fantasy. Richard Nixon may have had an obsession about establishing his reputation for a realistic foreign policy, but his embrace of Mao and Red China should never have included the sellout of Taiwan. Such dishonorable conduct sent a signal to both Communist China as well as American presidential candidates that groveling in Beijing would be applauded. Subsequent Presidents, desperate for the blessings of D.C. elites and the New York Times regarding their foreign policy “credentials”, gave away the store on trade practices. How else to explain our frightful dependence on China for pharmaceutical products, for protective medical equipment, and for essential components of many other crucial technologies? Our national security should never have been exchanged for cheap T-shirts and made-in-China trinkets.

Now, in the aftermath of the Wuhan virus, aka Covid-19, an awakening is underway. The dopey utopianism of John Lennon’s “Imagine” is giving way to a clear-eyed recognition that America’s interests are not China’s interests. China is a brutal dictatorship that specializes in concentration camps, “re-education”, and the theft of intellectual property. I will happily pay more for my next T-shirt or aspirin if only to stand apart from such a criminal regime. And yes, I can feel sorry for the mass of Chinese people living under the steel-toed boot of Mao’s and Xi’s “workers’ paradise” without feeling any urgent desire to welcome China into the league of decent nations. A reckoning is overdue and underway. May it long continue.

Second, as part of a package of economic stimuli, there is talk in Washington of a massive national infrastructure investment program. The immediate goal, of course, is to get people and companies actively and continuously employed in gainful profitable pursuits. The concurrent goal is to fix and improve our roads, our bridges, our tunnels, and our urban transit. Broader boulevards, broader sidewalks, and dedicated bike lanes all have a place, and all need investment. Our airports need vast improvement as do our reservoirs, our aqueducts, and our shipping ports. Our national parks once served a nation of one hundred thirty million people. Our population today is well over three hundred million. Do the math and you’ll see the need. Our pipelines and our energy grids must be improved. We must also be prepared to aggressively protect our coastlines against rising sea levels. In balancing the equation of additional deficit spending, let’s bear in mind that five short months ago America’s economy was booming, and Americans' constant gripe was about congestion and gridlock. Let’s also bear in mind that such stimulative spending would beget the nation a fifty-year capital asset of enhanced transportation, communication, and quality of life.

Two silver linings to ponder.