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Dear Editor:
My mother was one of the most educated people I ever knew. She never attended college, but she and my dad shared a commodity currently at a premium: common sense. Between the two of them, I didn’t win many debates, my bachelor’s degree notwithstanding.
Another subject I broached carefully with my Great Depression-era parents was sacrifice.
Mom and Dad are long gone, but I wonder what the remaining members of their generation think about a society that clamored for a Covid-19 cure while resisting the steps needed to fight the virus. How do we reconcile trumpeting the Constitution and partisan politics to avoid wearing a face mask while over 600,000 people die?
The Great Depression generation must wince at us being coaxed/cajoled/bribed with gift cards and scholarships to take the vaccine. Ohio offered a chance to win a one-million-dollar prize –over a vaccine that’s free. Vaccine lotteries abound in other states, too.
As a baby boomer, I can’t speak for our elders. But I humbly thank them for their WWII rationing and general selflessness without expecting something in return.
Jim Newton
Itasca, Ill.
This Common Sense approach is reasonable, devoid of political sound bite, and from the Mid-West, something that Midwesterners respect more than talking points from the coasts. I thank you for bringing some pragmatism to the conversation.