The Power of Fear

Fear is quite a powerful force.  Our politicians are well aware of that fact, and have been through several administrations.  According to Scripture, it would seem the only thing more powerful than fear, is love.  In this world, love is sadly, in very short supply; so fear prevails.  As I read the headlines, the very first thing that crosses my mind, is of course; what are we not seeing while anywhere between 2-5 suspected cases of ebola are covering the country, raising the potential number exponentially?

Clearly, this is no accident!  This entire Dallas fiasco, is reprehensible.  First, they sent a very sick man home, then two days later, was brought back in by ambulance.  I realize we're being told it's all quite containable and under control, until the next headline . . . I do believe this entire "ebola scare" is very much under control, but I'm not thrilled with the ones who are in control!   We have since been told that everyone he came in contact with is being monitored.  The fact that he is dead and cannot give a full account of everyone with whom he had contact, obviously leaves that statement unconfirmed and unprovable.

Meanwhile, it seems a couple of healthcare workers at the Dallas hospital have absolutely no regard for those whom they may put in harm's way.  One, knowingly boarded a flight with a fever having called CDC, and well aware that a coworker was in isolation awaiting possible ebola confirmation, and that she also had cared for the man who had died.  This second health care worker was a lab tech, I believe who went on a cruise and got the whole ship turned around at Belize and headed back to the Texas port.  Isn't it great to know there are such caring, responsible people in health care?

While the ebola headlines continue to pervade our internet information, the human enterovirus 68 is losing media coverage.  What appeared to be a firestorm last month in 12 states has now been reported in 32 more, but on the decline?  I've included a CDC link with a map, that is said to revise and repost, weekly with new information.

KU Med Center is reported to have encountered two possible cases of ebola with the lab results coming back, negative.  Toward the end of the CDC report about the two patients at KU, one is suspected of possibly having contracted typhoid or typhus, and the other had malaria . . .  As it turns out, Big Pharma has vaccines for typhoid as well as typhus, and medications for the prevention and treatment of malaria.

With all the ebola headlines, I nearly missed this one.  http://7online.com/health/ebola-press-conference-at-yale-hospital/353216/

Heal me, O YHUH, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.  Prophet of Holy Scripture

John Fitzgerald Kennedy

I was five years old when JFK was assassinated.  I remember so many things about that week-end and so many thoughts that plagued my young mind, even then.  Fifty years later, it's still a day of remembrance for me.  It was such an influential event in my young life, to this day, when writing the date on November 22, it's a reflex to just write 1963.  It's automatic, like my birthday or my kid's.

There were many things about his presidency to which I related . . . First, I shared the same last name.  The Irish immigrants and descendants were not always embraced by those of other European origins, so it was not uncommon in the early part of the 20th century for Native Americans avoiding the Dawes Roll to "marry off" a sister to an Irish gentleman and the entire family take the name.  So, I was little brown Kennedy.  Second, Caroline was not quite a year older than I, and John Jr. was a few months older than my sister.  Third, when I I heard people speaking of the president there were frequent comments as to his youth and good looks.  I heard the same thing about my Daddy!  Keep in mind these are the thoughts of a five year old girl.

The heaviness, besides seeing a nation in mourning, was also of a personal nature.

 I already thought Vice President Johnson was a mean man.  I discerned a tone to his voice that made me very uneasy.  I didn't like watching him in news clips, not that I tuned in attentively every evening.  I watched him sworn in as President and I felt really, really queasy.  As President, he was going to take the house away from those little kids.  He was going to make those orphaned children move.  In my mind, President Johnson was causing those children who had just lost their father, to also lose their house.  Then when I saw the photo with the beagle the next year, the meanness was confirmed!
                             
   *photo in the article Post Kennedy White House



President Kennedy's short time in office and sudden death greatly affected our nation, and I believe some of the questions surrounding his election and death are foundational in the current dissatisfaction with the political system and our distrust of our political leaders.  What has been building for fifty years, often reflects back to his short time in the national spotlight.   At the time he died, it didn't matter if someone was republican or democrat, America's President had been killed.  The Warren Commission took less than a year to deliver the verdict of Lee Harvey Oswald as the lone assassin, but even then, there were some issues of logic and physics that challenged that report.

There have been many, many theories through the years, documentaries, and movies to fuel the theories that literally keep his death alive, in this nation.  Although I do not know who or how many were responsible for the death of President Kennedy, I do not believe Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone assassin, if he was involved at all.  There are some factors this writer believes fifty years later.  In 1964, the nation or it's leaders, thought we could put this tragedy behind us with an official report, even if we didn't really believe it.  We just wanted it all wrapped up neatly and the idea that our government could lie was unimaginable, and certainly unspeakable.
 

We have now come to realize, we chose to accept something official that is questionable.  We've let a number of illogical, unanswered questions stand as fact for fifty years, and that has eroded the trust of the people.  Not only is there reason to doubt some of the information contained in the report, we have to face the fact, that information was given to us by a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States of America.  Perhaps if the Warren Report actually answered the haunting questions, that horrible November day in Dallas, could have been laid to rest.

President Kennedy's death is no longer about his death, it's about what we were told and the reality that to question what we were told means we have doubts about those in authority.  This isn't about the Kennedys and this isn't about Lee Harvey Oswald, this is about distrust on the highest level of government and the fact that it has been building for half a century.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.  a Proverb of Holy Scripture