Science and Experts Matter

I've had two professional careers in my life. The first was as a Navy Hospital Corpsman and Preventive Medicine Technician. In that role I specialized in operational (field) preventive medicine, communicable disease control, infection control in health care facilities and disease vector control. 

After 21 years in the Navy. I started my second career as an intelligence officer for the Army and then Defense Intelligence Agency. In that position, I specialized in analyzing foreign military and civilian health conditions and capabilities. Later on, I specialized in intelligence community management, coordinating intelligence analysis between numerous DoD intelligence organizations and key allies. I also represented my agency as the Chair for Defense Intelligence at U. S. Army War College. 

I'm providing this quasi resume to illustrate that I have earned a degree of expertise in public health and national security and intelligence.

Expertise matters in this country. We *should* listen to people who know what they're talking about. If you are an electrician, plumber, auto mechanic, dentist, lawyer, programmer, etc, do you want to listen to someone who knew nothing of your profession except what they heard from some blowhard on TV or radio, or had googled something related to your area of expertise? Of course you wouldn't. If you're like quite a few of my friends, you'd not only not listen, you'd call them on their BS. 

When I argue, on Facebook and elsewhere, that facemasks work, or that the White House is badly bungling its COVID-19 response, or that foreign policy under this administration is shredding alliances that prevented international conflagrations, it's not because I'm a Democrat or Republican or liberal or conservative, it's because I have a pretty good idea what I'm talking about. 

When world-renowned experts like Dr Anthony Fauci advise us on how to survive and get through the COVID-19 pandemic, it behooves us -- and the administration and Congress -- to listen and take them seriously. When foreign policy experts and intelligence experts warn against pursuing half-baked policies pushed by rank novices pushing personal agendas, it behooves us -- and the administration and Congress -- to listen and take them seriously.

If you ignore a highly infectious, novel respiratory virus, a lot of people will get sick and a lot will die. Clausewitz and our history tell us that nature and our enemies get a vote. Our experience today tells us that viruses don't give a damn about what we think or plan. We can't all be experts in everything so it behooves us to listen to those who have sweated and studied to become experts in their chosen fields, and then take them seriously. 

Facts matter. Science matters. And nature doesn't care what we'd like to happen.