Pelotudos

It's hard to know where to start. We need to keep reminding ourselves that the vast majority are, a) not going to die and b) are doing what they can to help everyone else, whether by social distancing or self-isolating. Yet there are a small number of what the Latin Americans call 'pelotudos' who simply can't help themselves.

Let's start today with the journalists who have axes to grind (don't worry, I'll get on to Ashley et al in later blogs). There are rather a lot of tossers in the media, but let's begin with two egregious examples. In the Guardian we have people like Owen Jones (well done to him for signing the letter condemning his colleague Selina Todd's right to freedom of expression, and about five million other offences) and in the Telegraph we have Sherelle Jacobs, whose column this morning implies that President Trump is right and isn't it a pity that we are going to crash the economy just to save a few miserable lives.

The fact is (aka, my opinion is) that you can like these journalists and I'll still be your friend, but they, on the other hand, invariably don't like people whose opinions they disagree with. They are fighting wars that are totally irrelevant to the vast majority of the country, secure in their metropolitan bubble of righteousness. I don't want them to be stopped from writing their bilge and bile, but I do think we should just ignore it. Fortunately, in the real world, that's what most of us do.

The other fact is (OK, my opinion again) that on an emotionless level (i.e. if you have Trump-Jones-Jacobs levels of brainpower) then a disease that largely affects the economically inactive should not crash the economy. That is, until you start to worry if your 91 year old father or one year old grandson might get it.