Revache & repair: The extremist debt ceiling standoff in Washington D.C., placing us a week away from defaulting on payments to our country’s trade partners and creditors thereby kicking off a spiral of mayhem and national decline, isn’t primarily aimed at public health. There is the REINS Act inserted by the Republicans in their demand package1 – a rule they perennially try to pass – that would give Congress authority to overrule emergency federal regulations, including those surrounding public health, should another pathogen even twice as lethal as COVID hit our world. But on the surface, this standoff’s aim appears to be reversing the 24 climate action & construction incentives from the 2022-passed Inflation Reduction Act, and accelerating oil & gas drilling permits5.
However, the conversation surrounding this debt ceiling episode is inducing a lossy compression2 on the record of the COVID pandemic. And that distortion is twisting this standoff.
History erasure is …
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