Political Satire: The Old Man of the Mountain (26)

Subtitle: If you know danger is coming, why wait for it?

Narrator: The priest arrived at a large wooden building in a tribal region. He learned from a native outside the building that it was a tribal court that was about to settle a dispute between two villagers. The priest was given permission to sit in for the court hearing as it was the tribal policy to show all people, especially outsiders, of fairness and transparency in all trials.

He found dozens of people including the judge, witnesses, relatives and friends of the disputing parties inside the court. The parties to the lawsuit -- each consisting of a tribesman and his spouse -- sat in opposite corners far away from each other. The priest learned from the court proceedings that the dispute was about a fire that started in the evening three weeks ago from the defendant's barn at one end of a tribal village but soon spread from house to house and finally to the plaintiff's house at the other end of the village.

The fire killed dozens of villagers including the defendant's mother (aged 80) and three children (aged 7, 9 and 10) and the plaintiff's father and mother (aged 93 and 90 respectively) and four children ( aged 5, 6, 8 and 9). All the four members of the disputing parties were bald as they had lost all their hair in the big fire. Their bodies and limbs were partially burnt. The moustaches and beards of both men were no more to be seen in their faces which were wrapped partially with bandages.

Even though the two were always at each other's throats, the plaintiff still called the defendant "his good friend". The plaintiff was accusing the defendant of covering up at the very beginning of the fire.

The judge ordered two policemen to carry in a drum or steel container (of capacity of 200 litres) which contained some firewood, and placed it before him.

Judge (to the defendant): Did you sound the alarm about the fire?

Defendant: Yes, when I found the hay was burning in my barn, I alerted all residents by shouting "Fire! Fire!"

Judge (to the plaintiff): Did you hear him sounding the alarm?

Plaintiff: No!

Judge: But did you know his barn was on fire at that time?

Plaintiff: Yes.

Judge: How did you know it?

Plaintiff: I went outside of my house to see what all the commotion was about. Then I saw his barn was on fire in the distance.

Judge: Since you knew his barn was on fire, you and your family members should have ample time to run to safety especially you were staying far away at the other end of the village.

Plaintiff: He should have sounded the alarm earlier.

Defendant: In fact, he should be one of the earliest to know my barn was on fire. His son was playing near my barn. When I found him, his clothes were burning. After extinguishing the fire on his body, I asked him to run home at once to alert his family and other villagers about the fire. There was no time to find anything to cover his body.

Judge (to the plaintiff): Had your son alerted you to the fire?

Plaintiff (wiping his eyes): No, the last time I saw him in my house, he was already burnt to death.

Judge: Was he wearing any trousers?

Plaintiff (crying): Your Honour, whatever on his body was burnt to ashes. His body was as black as coal.

Defendant: He had a lot of time to bring his whole family to safety. Instead, according to some villagers, he was standing outside his house, not only watching, gesticulating and laughing at my misfortune but calling me a "sick man".

Plaintiff: Lies! Lies! Fake news! Fake news!

Judge: You seem to implicate him in starting the fire to burn your house and family. Have you any evidence to implicate him in committing an arson?

Plaintiff: My good friend and his family should be held responsible.

Judge: You still call him "your good friend"? Woe betide anyone whom you call "your good friend"!

Plaintiff: They should be held responsible! They hurt the villagers very badly. They hurt themselves also.

Judge: It is not uncommon for whole villages and slums around the world to be burnt to the ground. So far nobody has been charged for a fire that started from his home unless it could be proved to be a crime of arson. All the people in the village were aware of the raging hay fires in his barn, and they, especially you, should have ample time to run to safety. Furthermore, such factors as the dry weather, strong wind and close proximity of houses have to be taken into account in the tragedy.

All this while, you seem to implicate that he was committing arson to bring destruction to your home and family, but you offer no evidence. If he really intends to kill you and your family, why should he start the fire in his own house? He could have set fire to your house without further ado.

Plaintiff: The fire should have stopped at his barn. More family members of his should have been killed by the fire instead of mine.

Narrator: The judge ordered a policeman to ignite the firewood in the steel container. To the amazement of everyone, he turned to it and asked the fire why it did not stop at the barn.

Plaintiff: Your Honour, are you kidding?

Judge: Because the fire is the real criminal. If you know danger or the fire is coming, why wait for it?

Narrator: In a fit of rage, the plaintiff rushed out of the court, crying foul at the judge's act and accusing him of being the defendant's puppet. He claimed that the judge was doing a sad job of covering up the defendant's initial bad handling of the fire to let it spin out of control.

 

The following is my answer to a netizen in another forum who asked: "So the real message is.....'Because the VIRUS is the real criminal. If you know/knew the danger of the VIRUS is coming, why wait for it?' Or am I missing something?"

1. Let us look at some cases of real fires instead of the fictitious hay fire in my fairy tale:

According to Reuters, there have been 2,200 fires in Manila this year, and most have ignited in the city’s slums. With no real building or fire codes to speak of, the slums are tinderboxes waiting for disaster to strike. Many homes are built of plywood and exposed electrical wires are everywhere. According to Reuters, the fires are mainly caused by faulty electrical connections, unattended stoves and discarded cigarette butts.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...vastating-fires-in-manilas-overcrowded-slums/

2. Whom could be charged in court for the damages caused by the fires? The fires? Faulty electrical connections? Unattended stoves? Discarded cigarette butts? The people who discarded cigarette butts? But could the police find them? What the police knew for sure that everything was burnt down by the fires.

Let us take another analogy. If somebody started a fire by throwing a cigarette butt into your bedroom through a window, would it be fair to charge you in court for the damages and deaths caused by the fire as it spread to other houses?

3. Let us look at the subtitle of the political satire "If you know danger is coming, why wait for it?" It's just a matter of common sense. The statement is not only about the danger of fire or the virus, it is about the danger of anything. For instance, if you saw a tiger approaching you from the distance, are you going to wait for it to come within one metre of you before you run for your life?

4. Now let us look at part of the 2-month damning timeline that shows how Trump dilly-dallied in his response to the coronavirus pandemic:

N.B US intelligence reports from January and February warned about a likely pandemic. However, the US was beset by denial and dysfunction as the coronavirus raged.

Dec. 31: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention learn of a cluster of cases in China.

Jan. 3: A Chinese official officially informs CDC Director Robert Redfield of the outbreak of a respiratory illness in the city of Wuhan. Redfield later relays the information to HHS Secretary Alex Azar, and Azar informs the White House National Security Council.

Jan. 22: Trump makes his first comments about the coronavirus, saying he is not concerned about a pandemic: “No. Not at all. And we have it totally under control. … It’s going to be just fine.”

Feb. 24: Trump says: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. … Stock Market starting to look very good to me!”

March 10: Trump says: “Just stay calm. It will go away.”

March 13: Trump declares a national emergency.

March 16: Trump for the first time publicly reflects on the gravity of he situation. Asked about his repeated comments saying the situation was “under control,” he says: “If you’re talking about the virus, no, that’s not under control for any place in the world. … I was talking about what we’re doing is under control, but I’m not talking about the virus.”

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...coronavirus-response-is-increasingly-damning/

5. Finally, you may have missed something in the following link:

https://metallicman.com/laoban4site...n-china-by-america-for-geopolitical-advantage

October 2019 – American Military in Wuhan, China.

300 US military personnel arrived in Wuhan for the Military World Games on October 19. The American contingent did so abysmally that many have wondered if the American standards of performance has lowered, or that the participants were there for another purpose.

“They claim the inattentive attitude and disproportionately below average results of American athletes in the game indicate they might have been in for other purposes and they might actually be bio-warfare operatives, and that their place of residence during their stay in Wuhan was also close to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where the first known cluster of cases occurred.”
-Wikipedia

And the poor showing by the American military wasn’t the only thing observed…

In October 2019, the US brought 172 (really 369) military athletes to Wuhan for the World Military Games. Despite having the largest military in the world, ten fold, the US came in 35th behind nations like Iran, Finland and Slovenia. No video or photos exist of the US team, no records were kept, a huge team but a pitiful performance for the best military in the world. ( Please refer to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Military_World_Games )

The US team did so badly that they were called “Soy Sauce Soldiers” by the Chinese. In fact, many never participated in any event and stayed near the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where the disease is said to have originated only days after the US left the area.

The US team went home on October 28, 2019 and within 2 weeks, the first human contact cases of COVID 19 were seen in Wuhan. The Chinese have not been able to find “patient zero” and believe he was a member of the US team.

They also have sources that say the US had misrepresented influenza that Trump claims has killed thousands, an influenza carried to China by the US team, an influenza that was really COVID 19, a disease developed in a military bio-warfare facility in the state of Washington, now “ground zero” in the US for COVID 19.

The Chinese claim, something censored in the US, that the inattentive attitude and disproportionately below average results of American athletes in the game indicate they might have been in for other purposes and they might actually be bio-warfare operatives, and that their place of residence during their stay in Wuhan was also close to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where the first known cluster of cases occurred.

https://www.veteranstoday.com/2020/...ng-army-games-hid-disease-in-us-as-influenza/

… the housing for the American military was also in close proximity to the [1] Iranian, [2] Italian and [3] South Korean military housings.

End October 2019

....Chinese medical staff went to the Dongfang Jianguo hotel to rescue five American military participants who were suffering from [1] high fevers, [2] shallow coughs, and [3] chest pains.
Once retrieved from the Dongfang Jianguo hotel they were sent to the Wuhan hospital. There, their symptoms were recorded, some treatment provided and they were immediately evacuated to the Wuhan Tianhe International Airport.

They were then picked up by a special US military airplane to evacuate them to the US.

After the American military contingent left China, the hotel staff started to come down with an illness.

In all, 42 employees of the Oriental Hotel were diagnosed with COVID-19, becoming the first cluster in Wuhan.

At the time only 7 people from the market had been thus diagnosed (and treated before the hotel staff). All 7 had contact with the 42 from the hotel. From this source, the virus spread to the rest of China.

October 2019

A video surfaced that alleges that an American service person appears to purposefully spread COVID in Wuhan.

In October, the US military went to Wuhan for the World Military Games.

— Rosemary (@RosemaryLxiao) March 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/RosemaryLxiao/status/1240908437271334913

2 November 2019 – Wuhan Outbreaks.

The first (well established) coronavirus case in Wuhan appeared two weeks later, on November 2. [renamed to COVID-19]

First Chinese Case of COVID-19 traced to November.

Keep in mind that the Coronavirus incubation period is 14 days.

So, fourteen days later…

15 November 2019

29 June 2018

“”Intelligence report warned of coronavirus crisis as early as November: Sources

“Analysts concluded it could be a cataclysmic event,” a source says.””

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/int...isis-early-november-sources/story?id=70031273

So the CIA knew before China about a virus outbreak of pandemic proportions?!.

So how did the President deal with this information?

Strangely, while President Trump was downplaying the news in China as “just a flu”,

President Trump did this…

Trump ordered his government to begin hiring thousands of Quarantine Public Health Advisors.

President Trump said one thing, and then in secret, did something else entirely different.

Imagine that!

6. So far the Chinese authorities have been keeping mum about the medical records of the five US soldiers who were retrieved from the Dongfang Jianguo hotel to the Wuhan hospital in late October last year. Perhaps they will release them as "nuclear bombs" at the right moment in the WHO investigation.