Just occasionally one particular moment, or series of moments, can touch the heart in such a way it releases an avalanche of mixed emotions: joy, sadness, intense happiness combining with immeasurable despair that leaves one shedding involuntary tears slow to abate at the sheer magnificence unfolding before one.
This is such a moment. The great Italian tenor, Andrea Bocelli, sings to an empty cathedral, then walks outside to a deserted piazza for his soulful lament of, “Amazing Grace.”
I find myself asking is this how it will end? One old man, left alone on a dying planet, singing his plaintive aria to an empty world.

Mrs Jones was seventy-one and a little frail, though otherwise healthy. She was standing at a bus stop in East London yesterday morning waiting for the number twenty-six bus to take her to see her son who lived in Islington. As she waited, a large articulated lorry transporting a shipping container passed her heading for the motorway. Mrs Jones didn’t know it, but the container was packed with illegal immigrants.

Two minutes after the lorry passed, Mrs Jones suffered a major cardiac arrest. She collapsed and died at the bus stop.

What do these “celebrities” all have in common?

Amanda Holden and Woody Harrelson

Anne-Marie

Jason Gardiner

I suppose one answer is they’re all desperate for attention, but the way to seek it is not by spreading untrue gossip and lies on social media.

All four so-called ‘celebs’, and probably a number of others, have used social media to further spread the insane idea that the coronavirus is a product of the 5G networks presently under construction in various parts of the world.

Idiocy? Undoubtedly. Maliciousness? Probably. A serious lack of responsibility and an admission of their own lack of any real intelligence? Without any doubt whatever.

If anything reveals the mistake we make in endowing so-called celebrities with some sort of divine power (and we do it all the time!)  this must surely be it.

Covid-19 is a member of the group of viruses known as coronaviruses. Scientists have known about them for a long time. They cause influenza and even the common cold. Do we blame television signals, or the billions of radio waves that have been traversing the planet for a hundred or more years, whenever we sneeze and reach for a handkerchief?

Celebrities like those above, who indulge themselves on social media knowing thousands of young people (and some not so young) are hanging on their every word, need to develop a more mature sense of responsibility.  Sadly, many allow their small amount of fame to swell their egos to the point they believe they’re better and wiser than anyone else. They’re not, and those four individuals above are the living proof of it.

As a result of their irresponsible actions crazy people are now setting fire to communication towers, whether they transmit 5G signals, or not, and causing serious damage at a time when the emergency services are already stretched to breaking point.

Well done, celebrities! Another example to show us all that just because someone manages to get their face on a TV screen, or can sing a song the recording companies can make money from, does not necessarily mean they are endowed with intelligence.

As for poor Mrs Jones, it was eventually decided that  the heart attack which killed her directly resulted from the passing by at the time of a container of illegal immigrants.  Somehow, though no-one quite understands how, the concealed immigrants had caused her death. Plausible?

No less so than the crazy idea that 5G causes pandemics.

^{Jared Kushner}

Today we hear how Donald Trump has called forth his sociopathic son-in-law, Jared Kushner to the daily ‘coronavirus taskforce briefing,’ with the brief to:

“Break down every barrier needed to make sure the teams can succeed.” Guardian

Kushner told reporters Trump was concerned about the supply shortages and had only heard about them that morning from “friends of his in New York.”

It’s somewhat strange that Donald Trump should be so ill-informed about the supply shortages, when only yesterday the Guardian newspaper led with the headline:

“Trump says US stockpile of protective equipment nearly gone amid coronavirus”

Donald Trump has admitted the US government’s emergency stockpile of protective equipment is nearly exhausted because of the extraordinary demands of the coronavirus pandemic…” Guardian

One of the sad things about social media has been the ability, by those who wish to make use of it, of lying through one’s teeth, often stating the most outrageous untruths, knowing that while many will recognise them as such there will be a hard core of brain-dead individuals who simply take it at face value and spread the word around the internet.

Right-wing radio ‘jocks’ in America have been using this tactic for decades. People like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and of course, Alex Jones with his infamous website, Infowars, have used this media to spread fake news and disinformation nationwide. The advent of the internet and social media like Twitter and Facebook (plus a whole torrent of others grabbing the lucrative slice of advertising revenue that goes hand-in-hand with these sites) has really opened up the floodgates for this right-wing poison to pour through.

Jared Kushner is expert at telling lies. He does it all the time, just like his father-in-law.  It’s so blatant that no-one with any cognitive skills would believe it for an instant. Sadly, decades of a US education system gradually stripped of funds, good teachers, and with school buildings left in serious disrepair, has left large sections of the American community seriously lacking in the ability to think for themselves. They have become pawns of the radio ‘jocks’, the fake news pundits, and even of the President of the United States himself and his dysfunctional family and hangers-on, who continuously desecrate  the Office they pretend to honour.

Kushner, it seems, is to usurp the responsibilities of the Vice President Mike Pence, only recently charged with taking control of the coronavirus outbreak.  Despite much denial, it would seem that yet again Trump is reverting to what he knows best, removing folk who don’t perform to his satisfaction. Or, maybe it’s just another way of absolving himself from any responsibility. It’s always been Trump’s modus operandi: never his fault, never his failing, always down to someone else.

The truth is he’s always been an abject failure. How many bankruptcies? Not his fault, of course. We learned from Michael Cohen, once Trump’s personal lawyer, that on Trump’s instructions:

“…he had sent letters to Trump’s high schools, colleges and the College Board (creator of the SAT), threatening them with legal action and jail time if they ever released Trump’s academic records.” Forbes

Trump lied when he insisted he “graduated first in his class” from the Wharton School at Pennsylvania University In fact, he wasn’t even close and graduated without honors. His father was an extremely wealthy and powerful New York figure. It’s likely money greased Trump’s path into Penn State.

So, perhaps, in reality Trump himself has been a victim of the sad demise of good educational standards in America. Though, in his case, he had the opportunities, just never took advantage of them. His academic record was abysmal and, according to those who knew him at the time, his attendance at college was minimal.

Hardly a great resumé for a future leader of the free world.

Still, Jared Kushner is obviously a smart lad, so maybe he’ll be able single-handedly to bring the coronavirus epidemic in America to a rapid end. After all, he did solve the Israeli/Palestinian crisis in the Middle East all on his own – didn’t he?

Well, didn’t he?