Trainee neophyte":fv4da6mk said:
Easy, tiger. I don't think Jake=Jacob.
I am a big fan of holding people accountable. If they don't like the heat, they don't have to be in the kitchen. Important people are paid the big bucks to make the importent decisions - if they make a hash of it, they really should suffer a bit more than a press conference where they smugly admit "mistakes were made", and "a thorough review" will ensure that "moving forward", it won't happen again, promise. Thy could have chosen a career in something a little less significant if they didn't want the pressure.
Jake has suggested previously that the government, by following the wrong advice, probably for political reasons, will result in a significant number of people dying unnecessarily, to put it bluntly. What level of accountability should be used for that sort of cock--up? How much accountability is too much accountability?
You really think that Jake is not Jacob? I think I'd put a tenner on it and I'm not given to betting.
But there are two things here: the culpability of the public and that of the politicians, as you have indicated.
I make no distinction between a barely articulate, over-tattood, overweight moron stuffing his/her trolley full at Tescos and a relatively well to do moron deciding that none of the restrictions could possibly apply to him/her and so deciding to hoof it off in the Range Rover to the holiday home at the weekend. To suggest that either of these groups (and all shades between) are powerless is utterly ridiculous and I imagine that not one person - including Jake - seriously believes otherwise.
As for the government, I think there are a number of factors to consider:
a. "Following the wrong advice". They can only go on the advice given. The problem is that the politicians are usually not intellectually equipped to assess the worth of the advice. That's why they get it from experts who are supposed to be up to speed. One of the reasons for this is the abysmal lack of science graduates in politics and the civil service and indeed in the wider establishment in general. By coincidence I'm currently bashing through Vol 3 of the official biography of Margaret Thatcher (a chemistry graduate). She was the first significant politician to latch on to the importance of environmental issues and so she organised a conference with expert scientists and insisted that her cabinet ministers attend. The latter group distinguished themselves by not having a clue about what was being explained to them and looking mightily bored throughout. I'm not suggesting that having a degree in PPE makes you incapable of taking sensible decisions but it does mean that it is unlikely that you will be able to evaluate scientific advice in any meaningful way.
b. We do of course not yet know what advice was proffered. I would imagine that a range of possible courses of action were presented. FWIW I would have gone for a complete shutdown of the country from the word go, long after having banned flights from China and Italy. However, politicians have to weigh up the politics of a course of action. It may have been judged that the public would simply not accept something so drastic. And you can typically imagine the politicians saying to the experts, "Look we need something which will have maximum effect while causing minimal disruption" and so they get the best possible compromise from the experts. What has actually happened will probably ease the way for producing really robust plans for the next outbreak and that might involve something of a much higher lethality.
c. As for the establishment trying to dodge the blame, they will be wasting their time as people who will want to blame them will do it anyway. What they do need to do in the inevitable enquiry is be completely transparent, honest and open. The public is not stupid and will understand that this whole thing is unprecedented in modern times. People will tolerate honest mistakes but they won't like being lied to.
d. Large chunks of the public have shown themselves to be simply silly. bm101's account of his neighbour's garden party was almost surreal, to me at least. We live in an age where many people seem to think that a long healthy life and great happiness are automatically theirs as of right and what's more somebody else should provide it. They've just had a wake up call to the effect that that is not the case. Some of them will be too thick to understand that. Finally this thread - which lest we forget is made up of relatively thinking people - has shown that a little knowledge, while not necessarily being a dangerous thing, certainly leads to people preaching about things of which they have little or no understanding (see also remarks about cabinet ministers above).
Finally, best wishes to MikeG and his mrs. I hope you're both seeing light at the end of the viral tunnel.
