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Letter to the Editor: Distance Results in Decrease

Why are sincere, concerned people angry enough to rally to cancel safe policies, silence governors and reopen businesses and beaches in spite of the risk to their health and postponing the end of COVID-19?

Distance results in decrease, as demonstrated on charts showing the spread in states and countries where leaders enforced stay-at-home policies for health and safety. Are representatives encouraging rallies connected to companies benefitting from this pandemic – Big Pharma, sellers of medical equipment, online retailers, online private schools, Facebook and Google – to name a few?

Divide-to-conquer is a strategy used to win elections in the United States and in many other countries. By labeling groups, encouraging debates about human rights that people already have, and creating apathy so people choose not to vote, authoritarian leaders win. 

Rallies may be the result of targeted messaging that pits people against one another without understanding who benefits. For example, in the 2018 elections, Mercer, Nix, Bannon and others from Cambridge Analytica created messages to target personalities using Facebook data to persuade voters. They were accused of using up to 87 million clandestinely harvested Facebook profiles to create a state-of-the-art database to help Trump win. After charges were filed about misuse of personal information, Emerdata acquired Cambridge Analytica and SCL and continues to profit using targeted marketing. Facebook still makes billions by mining and marketing personal data.

Voters are learning about divide-to-conquer strategies, blame shifting and how they were duped. They want to defeat representatives whose voting record belies the lip service they so eloquently expound when their agenda is to profit using voter suppression, deregulation, union busting/right to work and more.   

The presidential election is no longer a Democrat/Republican choice, but a choice between care and greed. A growing number of prominent Republicans say they can no longer support Trump and his hardcore followers. Enough is enough! Let’s unite to share facts and elect representatives who will make wise decisions to stop pandemics, not just to increase the wealth and power of a few. 

Carole Vande Walle

Fish Creek, Wisconsin