Chaos is the New Normal

“Normal is over.” Krystal Ball

Rapid change can be good. Spiraling, chaotic change is something else. No sooner do we hear about one challenge to our economic, social, or political life, than when another comes to make the change more extreme or take it in a completely different direction. Do you remember four years of Russia being our enemy, an existential threat to America? And before that, Islamic terrorism? Well, now it’s China. Very 1984 isn’t it?

Remember when corporate media was all about Trump and Impeachment? Then when it was all about elections? Now it’s all about the COVID 19 virus, and the profound ways it’s changing our lives every day. It feels silly to focus on career, on education, on making a home or raising a family, when we literally do not know whether our jobs or schools will be open tomorrow. For people with money, the current shutdown could be an enforced vacation, but for most people, those on the financial edge, without investments or at least Social Security, it is a catastrophe.

And it keeps changing every day. One day, you can go to a restaurant. The next day, only take-out, the next day, you’re on your own. One day, you can take the bus, the next day, only Uber and Lyft, the next day, walk, then stay inside. People try to organize, but no meetings and no demonstrations are allowed. Some who can afford them buy guns through…