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If they could... They would!
Wolf Blitzer put a terrific question to Rep. Ron Paul at last night’s CNN/Tea Party Express Republican debate in Tampa, Fla. What should happen, the moderator asked hypothetically, if a healthy 30-year-old man who can afford insurance chooses not to buy it—and then becomes catastrophically ill and needs intensive care for six months? When Dr. Paul ducked, fondly recalling the good old days before Medicare and saying that we should all take responsibility for ourselves, Blitzer pressed the point. “But, Congressman, are you saying the society should just let him die?” At that point, the rabble erupted in cheers and whoops of “Yeah!”
This was indeed an appalling, mob-mentality moment—more medieval, even, than the crowd applauding Gov. Rick Perry for winning the death-penalty derby at the previous debate. What it clarified, however, was less the cruelty of the Tea Party crowd than the absurdity of the health-care positions of all of the Republican candidates. The GOP contenders relentlessly attack “Obamacare” as “socialized medicine.” But they won’t speak up for either of the other two choices available to them: the arguably more socialized system we have hitherto lived with or the Blitzer option of letting the uninsured die in the streets.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/09/let-him-die-a-debate-question-exposes-the-incoherence-and-cowardice-of-the-republican-candidates-opposition-to-obamacare.html
This was indeed an appalling, mob-mentality moment—more medieval, even, than the crowd applauding Gov. Rick Perry for winning the death-penalty derby at the previous debate. What it clarified, however, was less the cruelty of the Tea Party crowd than the absurdity of the health-care positions of all of the Republican candidates. The GOP contenders relentlessly attack “Obamacare” as “socialized medicine.” But they won’t speak up for either of the other two choices available to them: the arguably more socialized system we have hitherto lived with or the Blitzer option of letting the uninsured die in the streets.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/09/let-him-die-a-debate-question-exposes-the-incoherence-and-cowardice-of-the-republican-candidates-opposition-to-obamacare.html
The people who said "Yeah!" are closer to power than they were in 2011. White House on speed dial, I'm sure there are some of them in the West Wing, you've probably got some in the House and Senate too. Point is, they're here.
If they had the power to triage people in this face of this pandemic, to choose who lives and who dies, then let's get real here... they would most certainly use it, and not based on objective decisions, not looking at health, or chances of survival, but their own biases would be the deciding factor.
People on government assistance... I'm sorry "undeserving" people on government assistance, *their* usage of welfare would be OK
Those with "pre-existing conditions", however they define it
Poor people
GLBTQ people
Immigrants
Muslims
Refugees and "rootless cosmopolitans"
Liberals
People with HIV/AIDS
Whoever QAnon tells them to hate
And others, could all be in danger, and not just from the virus
And can we really deny that, right now, they are not looking for ways to interfere with the process, for them to have a say in who lives and who dies?
Can we truly be safe in denying that there is a segment of the population planning to use this virus as their weapon of destruction? Can we take that risk?
